has produced in-depth measurements of X-ray emission from galaxy clusters. These measurements have revealed the internal distribution of matter within the clusters and, as a result, have provided the scientists with an opportunity to examine the Lambda-CDM theory, the current prevailing explanation for the structure and evolution of the universe.
Keeping this in mind, Stanford physics graduate student Elise Darragh-Ford and her colleagues examined computer-simulated clusters produced by the The Three Hundred Project. First, they computed what the X-ray emission for each simulated cluster should look like. Then, they applied the same observational criteria used to identify relaxed galaxy clusters from real data to the simulated images to winnow the set down.
The researchers next measured the relationships between three properties – the cluster mass, how centrally concentrated this mass is, and the redshift of the clusters, which reflects how old the universe was when the light we observe was emitted – for both the simulated Three Hundred Project clusters and 44 real clusters observed withThe team found consistent results from both data sets: overall, clusters have become more centrally concentrated over time, while at any given time, less massive...
In the future, the scientists hope to be able to expand the size of both the observed and simulated galaxy cluster data sets in their analysis. SLAC-supported projects coming online in the next few years, including the Rubin Observatory’s Legacy Survey of Space and Time and the fourth-generation cosmic microwave background experiment , will help identify a much larger number of galaxy clusters, while planned space missions, such as the’s ATHENA satellite, can follow up with X-ray measurements.
Reference: “The Concentration–Mass relation of massive, dynamically relaxed galaxy clusters: agreement between observations and ΛCDM simulations” by Elise Darragh-Ford, Adam B Mantz, Elena Rasia, Steven W Allen, R Glenn Morris, Jack Foster, Robert W Schmidt and Guillermo Wenrich, 23 February 2023,