Measurement of galaxy cluster integrated comptonization and mass scaling relations with the South Pole Telescope

• Published in: The Astrophysical Journal
• Main Authors: Saliwanchik, B. R., Montroy, T. E., Aird, K. A., Bayliss, M., Benson, B. A., Bleem, L. E., Bocquet, S., Brodwin, M., Carlstrom, J. E., Chang, C. L., Cho, H. M., Clocchiatti, A., Crawford, T. M., Crites, A. T., De Haan, T., Desai, S., Dobbs, M. A., Dudley, J. P., Foley, R. J., Forman, W. R., George, E. M., Gladders, M. D., Gonzalez, A. H., Halverson, N. W., Hlavacek-Larrondo, J., Holder, G. P., Holzapfel, W. L., Hrubes, J. D., Jones, C., Keisler, R., Knox, L., Lee, A. T., Leitch, E. M., Liu, J., Lueker, M., Luong-Van, D., Mantz, A., Marrone, D. P., McDonald, M., McMahon, J. J., Mehl, J., Meyer, S. S., Mocanu, L., Mohr, J. J., Murray, S. S., Nurgaliev, D., Padin, S., Patej, A., Pryke, C., Reichardt, C. L., Rest, A., Ruel, J., Ruhl, J. E., Saro, A., Sayre, J. T., Schaffer, K. K., Shirokoff, E., Spieler, H. G., Stalder, B., Stanford, S. A., Staniszewski, Z., Stark, A. A., Story, K., Stubbs, C. W., Vanderlinde, K., Vieira, J. D., Vikhlinin, A., Williamson, R., Zahn, O., Zenteno, A.
• Other Authors: Mcdonald, M., Mcmahon, J. J.
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: 2015
• Subjects: Galaxies: clusters: general; Methods: data analysi; X-rays: galaxies: cluster; Astronomy and Astrophysic; Space and Planetary Science; South Pole; South pole
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/11368/2962559; https://doi.org/10.1088/0004-637X/799/2/137; https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0004-637X/799/2/137

We describe a method for measuring the integrated Comptonization (Y SZ) of clusters of galaxies from measurements of the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (SZ) effect in multiple frequency bands and use this method to characterize a sample of galaxy clusters detected in the South Pole Telescope (SPT) data. We use a Markov Chain Monte Carlo method to fit a β-model source profile and integrate Y SZ within an angular aperture on the sky. In simulated observations of an SPT-like survey that include cosmic microwave background anisotropy, point sources, and atmospheric and instrumental noise at typical SPT-SZ survey levels, we show that we can accurately recover β-model parameters for inputted clusters. We measure Y SZ for simulated semi-analytic clusters and find that Y SZ is most accurately determined in an angular aperture comparable to the SPT beam size. We demonstrate the utility of this method to measure Y SZ and to constrain mass scaling relations using X-ray mass estimates for a sample of 18 galaxy clusters from the SPT-SZ survey. Measuring Y SZ within a 0.'75 radius aperture, we find an intrinsic log-normal scatter of 21% ± 11% in Y SZ at a fixed mass. Measuring Y SZ within a 0.3 Mpc projected radius (equivalent to 0.'75 at the survey median redshift z = 0.6), we find a scatter of 26% ± 9%. Prior to this study, the SPT observable found to have the lowest scatter with mass was cluster detection significance. We demonstrate, from both simulations and SPT observed clusters that Y SZ measured within an aperture comparable to the SPT beam size is equivalent, in terms of scatter with cluster mass, to SPT cluster detection significance.