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S. Ettori

Publications and source records attributed to S. Ettori.

At least 163 records · Page 9Linked to original sources

The outer regions of galaxy clusters: Chandra constraints on the X-ray surface brightness

(Abridged version) We study the properties of the X-ray surface brightness profiles in a sample of galaxy clusters that were observed with Chandra and have emission detectable with a signal-to-noise ratio higher than 2 at a radius beyond R500 ~ 0.7 R200. Our study aims to measure the slopes of the X-ray surface brightness and of the gas density profiles in the outskirts of massive clusters. These constraints are compared to similar results obtained from observations and numerical simulations of the temperature and dark matter density profiles with the intention of presenting a consistent picture of the outer regions of galaxy clusters. We extract the surface brightness profiles Sb(r) of 52 X-ray luminous galaxy clusters at z>0.3 from X-ray exposures obtained with Chandra. We estimate R200 using both a beta-model that reproduces Sb(r) and scaling relations from the literature. The two methods converge to comparable values. We determine the radius, R_S2N, at which the signal-to-noise ratio is larger than 2 and select the objects in the sample that satisfy the criterion R_S2N/R200 > 0.7. For the eleven selected objects, we model with a power-law the behaviour of Sb(r). We measure a consistent steepening of the Sb(r) profile moving outward from 0.4 R200, where an average slope of -3.6 (sigma=0.8) is estimated. At R200, we evaluate a slope of -4.3 (sigma=0.9) that implies a slope in the gas density profile of -2.6 and a predicted mean value of the surface brightness in the 0.5-2 band of 2e-12 erg/s/cm2/deg2. Combined with estimates of the outer slope of the gas temperature profile and expectations about the dark matter distribution, these measurements allow us to describe properly how X-ray luminous clusters behave out to the virial radius.

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Reconstructing mass profiles of simulated galaxy clusters by combining Sunyaev-Zeldovich and X-ray images

We present a method to recover mass profiles of galaxy clusters by combining data on thermal Sunyaev-Zeldovich (tSZ) and X-ray imaging, thereby avoiding to use any information on X-ray spectroscopy. This method, which represents a development of the geometrical deprojection technique presented in Ameglio et al. (2007), implements the solution of the hydrostatic equilibrium equation. In order to quantify the efficiency of our mass reconstructions, we apply our technique to a set of hydrodynamical simulations of galaxy clusters. We propose two versions of our method of mass reconstruction. Method 1 is completely model-independent, while Method 2 assumes instead the analytic mass profile proposed by Navarro et al. (1997) (NFW). We find that the main source of bias in recovering the mass profiles is due to deviations from hydrostatic equilibrium, which cause an underestimate of the mass of about 10 per cent at r_500 and up to 20 per cent at the virial radius. Method 1 provides a reconstructed mass which is biased low by about 10 per cent, with a 20 per cent scatter, with respect to the true mass profiles. Method 2 proves to be more stable, reducing the scatter to 10 per cent, but with a larger bias of 20 per cent, mainly induced by the deviations from equilibrium in the outskirts. To better understand the results of Method 2, we check how well it allows to recover the relation between mass and concentration parameter. When analyzing the 3D mass profiles we find that including in the fit the inner 5 per cent of the virial radius biases high the halo concentration. Also, at a fixed mass, hotter clusters tend to have larger concentration. Our procedure recovers the concentration parameter essentially unbiased but with a scatter of about 50 per cent.

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ICM properties and AGN distribution in high-z RCS clusters

Here we discuss the X-ray properties of clusters of galaxies optically selected in the Red-Sequence Cluster Survey (RCS) observed with the Chandra satellite, at redshifts 0.6 < z < 1.2. We intended to assess the evolutionary stage of optically selected high-z clusters of galaxies, performing a spectral analysis of the diffuse emission from their ICM. We also investigated the distribution of AGN in their surroundings. The background subtracted spectra were analyzed and fitted with a single temperature model to measure average ICM temperature, X-ray bolometric luminosity and Fe abundance within typical radii between 200 and 350 kpc. We also analyzed the point source number density and spatial distribution in the RCS clusters fields as a function of the X-ray flux. We detected emission for the majority of the clusters, except for three, for which we have only marginal detection at ~3 Sigma. We find that the normalization of the L-T relation for RCS clusters is a factor of ~2 lower than the one for X-ray selected clusters. We confirm that the Fe abundance in the detected objects is consistent with that of X-ray selected clusters at the same redshift. We also found an excess of low-luminosity AGN towards the center of the clusters.

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X-MAS2: Study Systematics on the ICM Metallicity Measurements

(Abridged)The X-ray measurements of the ICM metallicity are becoming more frequent due to the availability of powerful X-ray telescope with excellent spatial and spectral resolutions. The information which can be extracted from the measurements of the alpha-elements, like Oxygen, Magnesium and Silicon with respect to the Iron abundance is extremely important to better understand the stellar formation and its evolutionary history. In this paper we investigate possible source of bias connected to the plasma physics when recovering metal abundances from X-ray spectra. To do this we analyze 6 simulated galaxy clusters processed through the new version of our X-ray MAp Simulator, which allows to create mock XMM-Newton EPIC MOS1 and MOS2 observations. By comparing the spectroscopic results to the input values we find that: i) Fe is recovered with high accuracy for both hot (T>3 keV) and cold (T<2 keV) systems; at intermediate temperatures, however, we find a systematic overestimate which depends on the number counts; ii) O is well recovered in cold clusters, while in hot systems its measure may overestimate by a factor up to 2-3; iii) Being a weak line, the measurement of Mg is always difficult; despite of this, for cold systems (T<2 keV) we do not find any systematic behavior, while for very hot systems (T>5 keV) the spectroscopic measurement may be strongly overestimated up to a factor of 4; iv) Si is well recovered for all the clusters in our sample. We investigate in detail the nature of the systematic effects and biases found. We conclude that they are mainly connected with the multi-temperature nature of the projected observed spectra and to the intrinsic limitation of the XMM-Newton EPIC spectral resolution that does not always allow to disentangle among the emission lines produced by different elements.

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X-ray and Sunyaev-Zel'dovich scaling relations in galaxy clusters

[Abridged] We present an analysis of the scaling relations between X-ray properties and Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (SZ) parameters for a sample of 24 X-ray luminous galaxy clusters observed with Chandra and with measured SZ effect. These objects are in the redshift range 0.14--0.82 and have X-ray bolometric luminosity L>10^45 erg/s. We perform a spatially resolved spectral analysis and recover the density, temperature and pressure profiles of the ICM, just relying on the spherical symmetry of the cluster and the hydrostatic equilibrium hypothesis. We observe that the correlations among X-ray quantities only are in agreement with previous results obtained for samples of high-z X-ray luminous galaxy clusters. On the relations involving SZ quantities, we obtain that they correlate with the gas temperature with a logarithmic slope significantly larger than the predicted value from the self-similar model. The measured scatter indicates, however, that the central Compton parameter y_0 is a proxy of the gas temperature at the same level of other X-ray quantities like luminosity. Our results on the X-ray and SZ scaling relations show a tension between the quantities more related to the global energy of the system (e.g. gas temperature, gravitating mass) and the indicators of the structure of the ICM (e.g. gas density profile, central Compton parameter y_0), showing the most significant deviations from the values of the slope predicted from the self-similar model in the L-T, L-M_{tot}, M_{gas}-T, y_0-T relations. When the slope is fixed to the self-similar value, these relations consistently show a negative evolution suggesting a scenario in which the ICM at higher redshift has lower both X-ray luminosity and pressure in the central regions than the expectations from self-similar model.

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Entropy profiles in X-ray luminous galaxy clusters at z>0.1

[Abridged] The entropy distribution of the intracluster gas reflects both accretion history of the gas and processes of feedback which provide a further non-gravitational energy besides the potential one. In this work, we study the profiles and the scaling properties of the gas entropy in 24 hot (kT_{gas} > 6 keV) galaxy clusters observed with Chandra in the redshift range 0.14-0.82 and showing different states of relaxation. We recover the gas density, temperature and entropy profiles in a non-parametric way. Adding the hydrostatic equilibrium hypothesis, radial profiles are also obtained from the deprojection of the surface brightness, allowing to verify whether the hydrostatic equilibrium is a tenable hypothesis by comparison with the spectral measurements. We confirm that this is the case on scales larger than 100 kpc and discuss the deviations observed in few non-cooling core clusters in the inner regions. We show that the entropy profiles are remarkably similar outside the core and can be described by simple power-laws with slope of 1.0-1.2. We measure an entropy level at 0.1 R_{200} of 100-500 keV cm^2 and a central plateau which spans a wide range of value (~ a few-200 keV cm^2) depending on the state of relaxation of the source. To characterize the energetic of the central regions, we compare the radial behaviour of the temperature of the gas with the temperature of the dark matter T_{DM} by estimating the excess of energy Delta E = 3/2 k(T_{gas}- T_{DM}). We point out that Delta E ranges from ~ 0 in typical cooling-core clusters to few keV within 100 kpc in non-cooling core systems. We also measure a significant correlation between the total iron mass and the entropy outside the cooling region,whereas in the inner regions they anti-correlate strongly.

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A Chandra archival study of the temperature and metal abundance profiles in hot Galaxy Clusters at 0.1 < z < 0.3

We present the analysis of the temperature and metallicity profiles of 12 galaxy clusters in the redshift range 0.1--0.3 selected from the Chandra archive with at least ~20,000 net ACIS counts and kT>6 keV. We divide the sample between 7 Cooling-Core (CC) and 5 Non-Cooling-Core (NCC) clusters according to their central cooling time. We find that single power-laws can describe properly both the temperature and metallicity profiles at radii larger than 0.1 r_180 in both CC and NCC systems, showing the NCC objects steeper profiles outwards. A significant deviation is only present in the inner 0.1 r_180. We perform a comparison of our sample with the De Grandi & Molendi BeppoSAX sample of local CC and NCC clusters, finding a complete agreement in the CC cluster profile and a marginally higher value (at ~1sigma) in the inner regions of the NCC clusters. The slope of the power-law describing kT(r) within 0.1 r_180 correlates strongly with the ratio between the cooling time and the age of the Universe at the cluster redshift, being the slope >0 and tau_c/tau_age<=0.6 in CC systems.

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Evolution in the iron abundance of the ICM

We present a Chandra analysis of the X-ray spectra of 56 clusters of galaxies at $z>0.3$, which cover a temperature range of $3> kT > 15$ keV. Our analysis is aimed at measuring the iron abundance in the ICM out to the highest redshift probed to date. We find that the emission-weighted iron abundance measured within $(0.15-0.3) R_{vir}$ in clusters below 5 keV is, on average, a factor of $\sim2$ higher than in hotter clusters, following $Z(T)\simeq 0.88 T^{-0.47} Z_\odot$, which confirms the trend seen in local samples. We made use of combined spectral analysis performed over five redshift bins at $0.3> z > 1.3$ to estimate the average emission weighted iron abundance. We find a constant average iron abundance $Z_{Fe}\simeq 0.25 Z_\odot$ as a function of redshift, but only for clusters at $z>0.5$. The emission-weighted iron abundance is significantly higher ($Z_{Fe}\simeq0.4 Z_\odot$) in the redshift range $z\simeq0.3-0.5$, approaching the value measured locally in the inner $0.15 R_{vir}$ radii for a mix of cool-core and non cool-core clusters in the redshift range $0.1<z<0.3$. The decrease in $Z_{Fe}$ with $z$ can be parametrized by a power law of the form $\sim(1+z)^{-1.25}$. The observed evolution implies that the average iron content of the ICM at the present epoch is a factor of $\sim2$ larger than at $z\simeq 1.2$. We confirm that the ICM is already significantly enriched ($Z_{Fe}\simeq0.25 Z_\odot$) at a look-back time of 9 Gyr. Our data provide significant constraints on the time scales and physical processes that drive the chemical enrichment of the ICM.

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Tracing the evolution in the iron content of the ICM

We present a Chandra analysis of the X-ray spectra of 56 clusters of galaxies at z>0.3, which cover a temperature range 3 0.5. The emission weighted iron abundance is significantly higher (Z_{Fe}~0.4 Z_o) in the redshift range z~0.3-0.5, approaching the value measured locally in the inner 0.15 R_{vir} radii for a mix of cool-core and non cool-core clusters at 0.1<z<0.3. The decrease in metallicity with redshift can be parametrized by a power law of the form ~(1+z)^{-1.25}. The observed evolution implies that the average iron content of the ICM at present epoch is a factor of ~2 larger than at z~1.2. We confirm that the ICM is already significantly enriched (Z_{Fe} ~ 0.25 Z_o) at a look-back time of 9 Gyr. Our data provide significant constraints on the time scales and physical processes which drive the chemical enrichment of the ICM. (abridged)

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Simulated X-ray galaxy clusters at the virial radius: slopes of the gas density, temperature and surface brightness profiles

Using a set of hydrodynamical simulations of 9 galaxy clusters with masses in the range 1.5 10^{14} M_sun < M_vir < 3.4 10^{15} M_sun, we have studied the density, temperature and X-ray surface brightness profiles of the intracluster medium in the regions around the virial radius. We have analyzed the profiles in the radial range well above the cluster core, the physics of which are still unclear and matter of tension between simulated and observed properties, and up to the virial radius and beyond, where present observations are unable to provide any constraints. We have modeled the radial profiles between 0.3 R_200 and 3 R_200 with power laws with one index, two indexes and a rolling index. The simulated temperature and [0.5-2] keV surface brightness profiles well reproduce the observed behaviours outside the core. The shape of all these profiles in the radial range considered depends mainly on the activity of the gravitational collapse, with no significant difference among models including extraphysics. The profiles steepen in the outskirts, with the slope of the power-law fit that changes from -2.5 to -3.4 in the gas density, from -0.5 to -1.8 in the gas temperature, and from -3.5 to -5.0 in the X-ray soft surface brightness. We predict that the gas density, temperature and [0.5-2] keV surface brightness values at R_200 are, on average, 0.05, 0.60, 0.008 times the measured values at 0.3 R_200. At 2 R_200, these values decrease by an order of magnitude in the gas density and surface brightness, by a factor of 2 in the temperature, putting stringent limits on the detectable properties of the intracluster-medium (ICM) in the virial regions.

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Tracing the evolution in the iron content of the ICM

We present a Chandra analysis of the X-ray spectra of 56 clusters of galaxies at z>0.3, which cover a temperature range of 3>kT>15 keV. Our analysis is aimed at measuring the iron abundance in the ICM out to the highest redshift probed to date. We find that the emission-weighted iron abundance measured within (0.15-0.3)R_vir in clusters below 5 keV is, on average, a factor of ~2 higher than in hotter clusters, following Z(T)~0.88T^-(0.47)Z_o, which confirms the trend seen in local samples. We made use of combined spectral analysis performed over five redshift bins at 0.3>z>1.3 to estimate the average emission weighted iron abundance. We find a constant average iron abundance Z_Fe~0.25Z_o as a function of redshift, but only for clusters at z>0.5. The emission-weighted iron abundance is significantly higher (Z_Fe~0.4Z_o) in the redshift range z~0.3-0.5, approaching the value measured locally in the inner 0.15R_vir radii for a mix of cool-core and non cool-core clusters in the redshift range 0.1<z<0.3. The decrease in Z_Fe with redshift can be parametrized by a power law of the form ~(1+z)^(-1.25). The observed evolution implies that the average iron content of the ICM at the present epoch is a factor of ~2 larger than at z=1.2. We confirm that the ICM is already significantly enriched (Z_Fe~0.25Z_o) at a look-back time of 9 Gyr. Our data provide significant constraints on the time scales and physical processes that drive the chemical enrichment of the ICM.

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Effects of sedimented helium on the X-ray properties of galaxy clusters

In this Letter, we consider the role played by the sedimentation of helium nuclei on the emissivity and metallicity distribution of the X-ray emitting plasma in the cores of relaxed galaxy clusters. We model the gas density and temperature profiles of nearby cooling core clusters to estimate the gravitational acceleration acting on the helium and show that its sedimentation time scale is too long with respect to the present age of these objects to play a significant role. However, we argue that these time scales have to be definitely lower in the past allowing the helium to settle in the cluster cooling cores and raise its abundance to values higher than the solar one. A direct consequence of this speculation is that the helium, by increasing the total X-ray emissivity, reduces the measured metal abundance in the inner (r < 20 kpc) cluster regions.

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Systematics in the X-ray Cluster Mass Estimators

We examine the systematics affecting the X-ray mass estimators applied to a set of five simulated galaxy clusters. They have been processed through the X-ray Map Simulator, X-MAS, to provide Chandra-like long exposures that are analyzed to reconstruct the gas temperature, density, and mass profiles used as input. We find that at R_2500 the mass profile obtained via a direct application of the hydrostatic equilibrium equation is consistent within 1 sigma with the actual mass; although we notice this estimator shows high statistical errors due to high level of Chandra background. Instead, the poorness of the beta-model in describing the gas density profile makes the evaluated masses to be underestimated by \sim 40 per cent with respect to the true mass, both with an isothermal and a polytropic temperature profile. We also test ways to recover the mass by adopting an analytic mass model, such as those proposed by Navarro et al. (1997) and Rasia et al. (2004), and fitting the temperature profile expected from the hydrostatic equilibrium equation to the observed one. These methods and the one of the hydrostatic equilibrium equation provide a more robust mass estimation than the ones based on the beta-model. In the present work the main limitation for a precise mass reconstruction is to ascribe to the relatively high level of the background chosen to reproduce the Chandra one. After artificially reducing it by a factor of 100, we find that the estimated mass significantly underestimates the true mass profiles. This is manly due (i) to the neglected contribution of the gas bulk motions to the total energy budget and (ii) to the bias towards lower values of the X-ray temperature measurements because of the complex thermal structure of the emitting plasma.

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Evolution of the Color-Magnitude Relation in High-Redshift Clusters: Blue Early-Type Galaxies and Red Pairs in RDCS J0910+5422

The color-magnitude relation has been determined for the RDCS J0910+5422 cluster of galaxies at redshift z = 1.106. Cluster members were selected from HST ACS images, combined with ground--based near--IR imaging and optical spectroscopy. The observed early--type color--magnitude relation (CMR) in (i_775 -z_850) versus z_850 shows intrinsic scatters in color of 0.042 +/- 0.010 mag and 0.044 +/- 0.020 mag for ellipticals and S0s, respectively. From the scatter about the CMR, a mean luminosity--weighted age t > 3.3 Gyr (z > 3) is derived for the elliptical galaxies. Strikingly, the S0 galaxies in RDCS J0910+5422 are systematically bluer in (i_775 - z_850) by 0.07 +/- 0.02 mag, with respect to the ellipticals. The ellipticity distribution as a function of color indicates that the face-on S0s in this particular cluster have likely been classified as elliptical. Thus, if anything, the offset in color between the elliptical and S0 populations may be even more significant. The color offset between S0 and E corresponds to an age difference of ~1 Gyr, for a single-burst solar metallicity model. A solar metallicity model with an exponential decay in star formation will reproduce the offset for an age of 3.5 Gyr, i.e. the S0s have evolved gradually from star forming progenitors. The early--type population in this cluster appears to be still forming. The blue early-type disk galaxies in RDCS J0910+5422 likely represent the direct progenitors of the more evolved S0s that follow the same red sequence as ellipticals in other clusters. Thirteen red galaxy pairs are observed and the galaxies associated in pairs constitute ~40% of the CMR galaxies in this cluster.

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The near-infrared luminosity function of cluster galaxies beyond redshift one

We determined the K band luminosity function (LF) of cluster galaxies at redshift z~1.2, using near-infrared images of three X-ray luminous clusters at z=1.11,1.24,1.27. The composite LF was derived down to M*+4, by means of statistical background subtraction, and is well described by a Schechter function with K*=20.5 AB mag and alpha=-1. From the K band composite LF we derived the stellar mass function of cluster galaxies. Using available X-ray mass profiles we determined the M/L ratios of these three clusters, which tend to be lower than those measured in the local universe. With these data, no significant difference can be seen between the shapes of the cluster galaxies LF and the LF of field galaxies at similar redshift. We also found no significant evolution out to z ~1.2 in the bright ( 2. The results obtained in this work support and extend previous findings that most of the stars in bright galaxies were formed at high redshift, and that K-bright (M>10^11 Msun) galaxies were already in place at z ~ 1.2, at least in the central regions of X-ray luminous clusters. Together with recent results on the field galaxies stellar mass function, this implies that most of the stellar mass is already assembled in massive galaxies by z ~ 1, both in low and high density environments.

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Chandra observation of the multiple merger cluster Abell 521

We present the Chandra analysis of the galaxy cluster A521 (z=0.247). The high resolution of the Chandra observation has allowed us to refine the original merging scenario proposed for A521, and to reveal new features in its X-ray emission. A521 has strongly substructured ICM density and temperature maps. Its X-ray diffuse emission is elongated along a NW/SE direction (SX2) and shows two major components, a main cluster and a northern group of galaxies. This latter is in turn substructured, showing a clump of cold and very dense gas centred on the BCG, and a northern tail aligned in the SX2 direction. A compression of the X-ray isophotes is also observed South of the BCG. We conclude that the northern group is infalling onto the main cluster along the NW/SE direction. This hypothesis is corroborated by the presence of a hot bar in the ICM temperature map located between the southern and northern regions, as the gas could be compressionally heated due to the subclusters' collision. The hot region corresponds to the eastern part of an over-dense ridge of galaxies, along which it was originally suggested that a merging of subclusters has recently occurred along the line of sight. An alternative hypothesis about the origin of the hot central bar is that we could observe in projection the shock fronts due to this older cluster-cluster collision. Two other structures possibly interacting with the main cluster are detected on the West and North-East sides of the BCG. We also uncover the presence of two northern edges in the ICM density. A521 is a spectacular example of a multiple merger cluster made up by several substructures converging at different epochs towards the centre of the system. The very pertubed dynamical state of this cluster is also confirmed by our discovery of a radio relic in its South-East region.

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The baryon fraction in hydrodynamical simulations of galaxy clusters

We study the baryon mass fraction in a set of hydrodynamical simulations of galaxy clusters performed using the Tree+SPH code GADGET-2. We investigate the dependence of the baryon fraction upon the radiative cooling, star formation, feedback through galactic winds, conduction and redshift. Both the cold stellar component and the hot X-ray emitting gas have narrow distributions that, at large cluster-centric distances r>R500, are nearly independent of the physics included in the simulations. Only the non-radiative runs reproduce the gas fraction inferred from observations of the inner regions (r ~ R2500) of massive clusters. When cooling is turned on, the excess star formation is mitigated by the action of galactic winds, but yet not by the amount required by observational data. The baryon fraction within a fixed overdensity increases slightly with redshift, independent of the physical processes involved in the accumulation of baryons in the cluster potential well. In runs with cooling and feedback, the increase in baryons is associated with a larger stellar mass fraction that arises at high redshift as a consequence of more efficient gas cooling. For the same reason, the gas fraction appears less concentrated at higher redshift. We discuss the possible cosmological implications of our results and find that two assumptions generally adopted, (1) mean value of Yb = fb / (Omega_b/Omega_m) not evolving with redshift, and (2) a fixed ratio between f_star and f_gas independent of radius and redshift, might not be valid. In the estimate of the cosmic matter density parameter, this implies some systematic effects of the order of Delta Omega_m/Omega_m < +0.15 for non-radiative runs and Delta Omega_m/Omega_m ~ +0.05 and < -0.05 for radiative simulations.

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Brief history of the metal accumulation in the intracluster medium

We use models of the rates of Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia) and core-collapse supernovae, built in such a way that both are consistent with recent observational constraints at z<1.6 and can reproduce the measured cosmic star formation rate, to recover the history of the metals accumulation in the intra-cluster medium. We show that these SN rates, in unit of SN number per comoving volume and rest-frame year, provide on average a total amount of Iron that is marginally consistent with the value measured in galaxy clusters in the redshift range 0-1, and a relative evolution with redshift that is in agreement with the observational constraints up to z~1.2. Moreover, we verify that the predicted metals to Iron ratios reproduce the measurements obtained in nearby clusters through X-ray analysis, implying that (1) about half of the Iron mass and >75 per cent of the Nickel mass observed locally are produced by SN Ia ejecta, (2) the SN Ia contribution to the metal budget decreases steeply with redshift and by z~1 is already less than half of the local amount and (3) a transition in the abundance ratios relative to the Iron is present between redshifts ~0.5 and 1.4, with core-collapse SN products becoming dominant at higher redshifts.

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