Orateur
Description
In the coming years, we will use the latest generation of Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (SZ) detectors to discover galaxy clusters at lower masses---and therefore higher redshifts---than ever before. These high-z, low-mass clusters are the progenitors of low-z, high-mass clusters, and follow-up X-ray observations will reveal insight into the origin and evolution of clusters. However, our understanding of the properties of z$\sim$0 clusters is currently limited by selection biases, so we are in need of a statistically complete low-z sample to anchor our studies of high-z clusters.
To this end, we designed the Cluster Evolutionary Reference Ensemble At Low-z (CEREAL) to be a representative population of massive, nearby galaxy clusters. These 108 clusters were cleanly selected in mass and redshift from the Planck 2nd SZ Survey and followed up uniformly with Chandra. They have masses spanning the range between the evolutionary tracks of the Perseus cluster and the Coma cluster as well as a narrow redshift spread around z=0.2. They correspond to the descendants of the lowest mass clusters that we expect to observe at z$\sim$2 with the third-generation detector on the South Pole Telescope (SPT-3G).
We are using the CEREAL sample to completely characterize the population of low-z clusters. We study the cool core fraction, the merger rate, and other morphological properties, as well as the thermodynamic and chemical enrichment profiles. We also carefully examine each cluster in search of interesting phenomena like bubbles produced by AGN feedback or multiple mergers. Together with new high-z observations, the CEREAL sample will facilitate evolutionary studies of galaxy clusters.
