Weak lensing observations of potentially X-ray underluminous galaxy clusters

¹ ESO, Karl-Schwarzschild-Str. 2, 85748 Garching b. München, Germany e-mail: jdietric@eso.org
² INAF - Osservatorio Astronomico di Trieste, via G. B. Tiepolo 11, 34143 Trieste, Italy
³ Max-Planck Institut für extraterrestrische Physik, Gießenbachstr., 85748 Garching b. München, Germany
⁴ Argelander-Institut für Astronomie, Auf dem Hügel 71, 53121 Bonn, Germany

Received: 27 November 2008
Accepted: 19 March 2009

Abstract

Optically selected clusters of galaxies display a relation between their optical mass estimates and their X-ray luminosities L_X that has a large scatter. A substantial fraction of optically selected clusters have L_X estimates or upper limits significantly below the values expected from the L_X-mass relation established for X-ray selected clusters, i.e., these clusters are X-ray underluminous for their mass. We attempt to confirm or falsify the X-ray underluminous nature of two clusters, Abell 315 and Abell 1456, by using weak gravitational lensing as a third and independent measure of the clusters' masses. We obtained optical wide-field imaging data and selected background galaxies using their colors and measured the shear exerted by the tidal field of the foreground galaxy clusters. We then fitted parametrized models to our shear catalogs. After accounting for projections of large-scale structure and halo triaxiality, we find that A 315 is significantly X-ray underluminous for its mass, while no significant lensing signal was detected for A 1456. We re-evaluate earlier kinematic and X-ray analyses of these two clusters and discuss the nature of the X-ray underluminous cluster A 315 and why A 1456 was probably erroneously identified as being X-ray underluminous.