Abstract
Contributed Talk - Splinter CCAT
Tuesday, 19 September 2017, 16:05 (Auditorium MPS)
Observations of the relativistic SZ effect:
From \it Planck to CCAT-p
Jens Erler1, Kaustuv Basu1, Jens Chluba2, Frank Bertoldi1
1Argelander-Institut for Astronomy, University of Bonn
Auf dem Hügel 71, 53121 Bonn, Germany
2Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics, University of Manchester
Oxford Road, M13 9PL, U.K.
The Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (SZ) effect is a spectral distortion of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) due to inverse Compton scattering of CMB photons by free electrons in the hot plasma found in clusters of galaxies. Its signal is proportional to the line of sight integral of the thermal gas pressure and not dimmed with redshift. The SZ effect has been used extensively in the last two decades to detect and characterise galaxy clusters and has become an important tool for cosmology.
Due to the high
temperatures of several keV found in the ICM, relativistic effects are expected to distort the
SZ spectrum allowing to measure the temperature of the scattering gas. We attempt to measure these relativistic distortions by performing a stacking analysis of a large sample of galaxy clusters with data from the Planck mission. With its nine frequency channels, Planck allows to probe the entire spectrum of the SZ, making it ideally suited for this study. Of particular interest are high frequencies
from 353 up to 857 \mathrmGHz where the relativistic corrections are strongest but that are difficult to access with ground-based observatories.The main challenge in utilizing these
frequencies is to separate the SZ signal from much brighter galactic foregrounds as well as far infrared emission from the clusters themselves.
We conclude by providing an outlook for the upcoming CCAT-p telescope, which will improve upon Planck with lower noise and better spatial resolution.