Sunyaev-Zel'dovich Cluster Profiles Measured with the South Pole Telescope

• Main Authors: Plagge, T., Benson, B. A., Ade, P. A. R., Aird, K. A., Bleem, L. E., Carlstrom, J. E., Chang, C. L., Cho, H. -M., Crawford, T. M., Crites, A. T., de Haan, T., Dobbs, M. A., George, E. M., Hall, N. R., Halverson, N. W., Holder, G. P., Holzapfel, W. L., Hrubes, J. D., Joy, M., Keisler, R., Knox, L., Lee, A. T., Leitch, E. M., Lueker, M., Marrone, D., McMahon, J. J., Mehl, J., Meyer, S. S., Mohr, J. J., Montroy, T. E., Padin, S., Pryke, C., Reichardt, C. L., Ruhl, J. E., Schaffer, K. K., Shaw, L., Shirokoff, E., Spieler, H. G., Stalder, B., Staniszewski, Z., Stark, A. A., Vanderlinde, K., Vieira, J. D., Williamson, R., Zahn, O.
• Format: Text
• Language: unknown
• Published: arXiv 2009
• Subjects: Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics astro-ph.CO; FOS Physical sciences; South Pole; South pole
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.48550/arxiv.0911.2444; https://arxiv.org/abs/0911.2444

We present Sunyaev-Zel'dovich measurements of 15 massive X-ray selected galaxy clusters obtained with the South Pole Telescope. The Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (SZ) cluster signals are measured at 150 GHz, and concurrent 220 GHz data are used to reduce astrophysical contamination. Radial profiles are computed using a technique that takes into account the effects of the beams and filtering. In several clusters, significant SZ decrements are detected out to a substantial fraction of the virial radius. The profiles are fit to the beta model and to a generalized NFW pressure profile, and are scaled and stacked to probe their average behavior. We find model parameters that are consistent with previous studies: beta=0.86 and r_core/r_500 = 0.20 for the beta model, and (alpha, beta, gamma, c_500)=(1.0,5.5,0.5,1.0) for the generalized NFW model. Both models fit the SPT data comparably well, and both are consistent with the average SZ profile out to the virial radius. The integrated Compton-y parameter Y_SZ is computed for each cluster using both model-dependent and model-independent techniques, and the results are compared to X-ray estimates of cluster parameters. We find that Y_SZ scales with Y_X and gas mass with low scatter. Since these observables have been found to scale with total mass, our results point to a tight mass-observable relation for the SPT cluster survey. : 21 pages, 24 figures, updated to published version