XMM-SERVS X-ray extended Galaxy Cluster (XVXGC) catalog

¹ Kavli Institute for Astronomy and Astrophysics (KIAA), Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
² National Astronomical Observatories (NAOC), Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
³ Institute for Frontiers in Astronomy and Astrophysics, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 102206, China
⁴ Department of Astronomy, School of Physics, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
⁵ School of Astronomy and Space Science, University of Chinese Academy of Science, Beijing 100049, China
⁶ School of Astronomy and Space Science, Nanjing University, Nanjing, Jiangsu 210093, China
⁷ Key Laboratory of Modern Astronomy and Astrophysics (Nanjing University), Ministry of Education, Nanjing, Jiangsu 210093, China
⁸ Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, 525 Davey Lab, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802, USA
⁹ Institute for Gravitation and the Cosmos, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802, USA
¹⁰ Department of Physics, 104 Davey Lab, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802, USA
¹¹ College of Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence, Wenzhou University, 325035 Wenzhou, China
¹² Argelander-Institut für Astronomie (AIfA), Universität Bonn, Auf dem Hügel 71, 53121 Bonn, Germany

^★ Corresponding author; wwxu@pku.edu.cn

Received: 11 June 2024
Accepted: 18 September 2024

Abstract

Context. To explain the well-known tension between cosmological parameter constraints obtained from the primary cosmic microwave background (CMB) and those drawn from X-ray-selected galaxy cluster samples identified with early data, we propose a possible explanation for the incompleteness of detected clusters being higher than estimated. Specifically, we suggest that certain types of galaxy groups or clusters may have been overlooked in previous works.

Aims. We aim to search for galaxy groups and clusters with especially extended surface brightness distributions by creating a new X-ray-selected catalog of extended galaxy clusters from the XMM-Spitzer Extragalactic Representative Volume Survey (XMM-SERVS) data, based on a dedicated source detection and characterization algorithm optimized for extended sources.

Methods. Our state-of-the-art algorithm is composed of wavelet filtering, source detection, and characterization. We carried out a visual inspection of the optical image, and spatial distribution of galaxies within the same redshift layer to confirm the existence of clusters and estimated the cluster redshift with the spectroscopic and photometric redshifts of galaxies. The growth curve analysis was used to characterize the detections.

Results. We present a catalog of extended X-ray galaxy clusters detected from the XMM-SERVS data. The XMM-SERVS X-ray eXtended Galaxy Cluster (XVXGC) catalog features 141 cluster candidates. Specifically, there are 53 clusters previously identified as clusters with intracluster medium (ICM) emission (class 3); 40 that were previously known as optical or infrared (IR) clusters, but detected as X-ray clusters for the first time (class 2); and 48 identified as clusters for the first time (class 1). Compared with the class 3 sample, the “class 1 + class 2” sample is systematically fainter and exhibits a flatter surface brightness profile. Specifically, the median flux in [0.5–2.0] keV band for “class 1 + class 2” and class 3 sample is 1.288 × 10⁻¹⁴ erg/s/cm² and 1.887 × 10⁻¹⁴ erg/s/cm², respectively. The median values of β (i.e., the slope of the cluster surface brightness profile) are 0.506 and 0.573 for the “class 1 + class 2” and class 3 samples, respectively. The entire sample is available at the CDS.