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Deep CCD Surface Photometry of Galaxy Clusters I: Methods and Initial Studies of Intracluster Starlight

John J. Feldmeier·J. Christopher Mihos·Heather L. Morrison·Stephen A. Rodney·Paul Harding
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Abstract

We report the initial results of a deep imaging survey of galaxy clusters. The primary goals of this survey are to quantify the amount of intracluster light as a function of cluster properties, and to quantify the frequency of tidal debris. We outline the techniques needed to perform such a survey, and we report findings for the first two galaxy clusters in the survey: Abell 1413, and MKW 7 . These clusters vary greatly in richness and structure. We show that our surface photometry reliably reaches to a surface brightness of μ_v = 26.5 mags per arcsec. We find that both clusters show clear excesses over a best-fitting r^{1/4} profile: this was expected for Abell 1413, but not for MKW 7. Both clusters also show evidence of tidal debris in the form of plumes and arc-like structures, but no long tidal arcs were detected. We also find that the central cD galaxy in Abell 1413 is flattened at large radii, with an ellipticity of $\approx 0.8$, the largest measured ellipticity of any cD galaxy to date.

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John J. Feldmeier, J. Christopher Mihos, Heather L. Morrison, Stephen A. Rodney, Paul Harding. 2002-04-26. Deep CCD Surface Photometry of Galaxy Clusters I: Methods and Initial Studies of Intracluster Starlight. https://doi.org/10.1086/341472

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