Related papers: Cluster Dynamics and Cluster Masses
Clusters of galaxies are merging during the formation of large-scale structures in the Universe. Based on optical survey data, we identify a large sample of pre-mergers of galaxy clusters and merging subclusters in rich clusters. We find…
The mass measurement of galaxy clusters is an important tool for the determination of cosmological parameters describing the matter and energy content of the Universe. However, the standard methods rely on various assumptions about the…
We describe a maximum-likelihood method for determining the mass distribution in spherical stellar systems from the radial velocities of a population of discrete test particles. The method assumes a parametric form for the mass distribution…
The spin of galaxy clusters encodes key information about their formation, dynamics, and the influence of large-scale structure. However, whether clusters possess statistically significant spin and how to measure it observationally remain…
X-ray images of galaxy clusters often show disturbed structures that are indication of cluster mergers. As a complementary to our previous work on dynamical state of 964 clusters observed by the Chandra, we process the X-ray images for 1308…
Accurate measurements of the mass distribution in galaxy and cluster halos are essential to test the cold dark matter (CDM) paradigm. The cosmological model predicts a universal shape for the density profile in all halos, independent of…
Star clusters are ideal tracers of star formation activity in systems outside the volume that can be studied using individual, resolved stars. These unresolved clusters span orders of magnitude in brightness and mass, and their formation is…
Star clusters stand at the intersection of much of modern astrophysics: the interstellar medium, gravitational dynamics, stellar evolution, and cosmology. Here we review observations and theoretical models for the formation, evolution, and…
We investigate the internal structure of clusters of galaxies in high-resolution N-body simulations of 4 different cosmologies. There is a higher proportion of disordered clusters in critical-density than in low-density universes, although…
In this paper we investigate the velocity dispersion profiles of clusters of galaxies for seven cosmological models. One model is the SCDM model, and the others are six low-density models with the density parameter $\Omega=0.1$, 0.2 or 0.3…
What is the role of clusters of galaxies in probing the large-scale velocity field of the universe? We investigate the distribution of peculiar velocities of clusters of galaxies in the popular low-density ($\Omega=0.3$) flat…
A multi-object spectroscopy follow-up survey of galaxy clusters selected from the Red-sequence Cluster Survey (RCS) is being completed. About forty clusters were chosen with redshifts from 0.15 to 0.6, and in a wide range of richnesses. One…
Numerical simulations of clusters of galaxies provide a unique way to follow the dynamics of these systems. The models reveal many characteristics of the merging process of subclusters: shock structure and strength, temperature distribution…
We constrain the internal dynamics of a stack of 10 clusters from the GCLASS survey at 0.87<z<1.34. We determine the stack cluster mass profile M(r) using the MAMPOSSt algorithm of Mamon et al., the velocity anisotropy profile beta(r) from…
We use a matched filter algorithm to find and study clusters in both N-body simulations artificially populated with galaxies and the 2MASS survey. In addition to numerous checks of the matched filter algorithm, we present results on the…
We investigate the feasibility of carrying out likelihood analysis on the velocities of galaxy clusters to determine power spectrum parameters. Using N-body simulations of cosmological density fields we show that the velocity field traced…
The presence of multiple luminous galaxies in clusters can be explained by the finite time over which a galaxy sinks to the center of the cluster and merges with the the central galaxy. The simplest measurable statistic to quantify the…
In hierarchical clustering, galaxy clusters accrete mass through the aggregation of smaller systems. Thus, the velocity field of the infall regions of clusters contains significant random motion superimposed on radial infall. Because the…
Observations and theory both suggest that star clusters form sub-virial (cool) with highly sub-structured distributions. We perform a large ensemble of N-body simulations of moderate-sized (N=1000) cool, fractal clusters to investigate…
Clusters of galaxies are often embedded in larger-scale superclusters with dimensions of tens or perhaps even hundreds of Mpc. Observational and theoretical evidence suggest an important connection between cluster properties and their…