Cosmological Constraints from a 31 GHz Sky Survey with the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich Array
Abstract
We present the results of an analysis of 4.4 deg^2 selected from a 6.1 deg^2 survey for clusters of galaxies via their Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect at 31 GHz. From late 2005 to mid 2007, the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich Array observed four fields of roughly 1.5 deg^2 each. One of the fields shows evidence for significant diffuse Galactic emission, and is therefore excised from this analysis. We estimate the cluster detectability for the survey using mock observations of simulations of clusters of galaxies and determine that, at intermediate redshifts (z ~ 0.8), the survey is 50% complete to a limiting mass (M_(200ρ[overbar]) of ~6.0 × 10^(14) M_⊙, with the mass limit decreasing at higher redshifts. We detect no clusters at a significance greater than five times the rms noise level in the maps, and place an upper limit on σ_8, the amplitude of mass density fluctuations on a scale of 8 h^(-1) Mpc, of 0.84 + 0.04 + 0.04 at 95% confidence, where the first uncertainty reflects an estimate of additional sample variance due to non-Gaussianity in the distribution of clusters and the second reflects calibration and systematic effects. This result is consistent with estimates from other cluster surveys and cosmic microwave background anisotropy experiments.
Additional Information
© 2011 The American Astronomical Society. Received 2010 December 3; accepted 2011 February 15; published 2011 April 12. We thank John Cartwright, Ben Reddall, and Marcus Runyan for their significant contributions to the construction and commissioning of the SZA instrument. We thank the staff of the Owens Valley Radio Observatory and CARMA for their outstanding support. We thank Bryan Butler and Mark Gurwell for providing the Mars model to which the SZA data are calibrated. We also thank Laurie Shaw and Martin White for providing us with the simulations used in this work. We gratefully acknowledge the James S. McDonnell Foundation, the National Science Foundation, and the University of Chicago for funding to construct the SZA. The operation of the SZA is supported by NSF Division of Astronomical Sciences through grant AST-0604982. Partial support is provided by NSF Physics Frontier Center grant PHY-0114422 to the Kavli Institute of Cosmological Physics at the University of Chicago, and by NSF grants AST-0507545 and AST-05-07161 to Columbia University. A.M. acknowledges support from a Sloan Fellowship, D.P.M. from a Hubble Fellowship under NASA grant HST-HF-51259.01, S.M. from an NSF Astronomy and Astrophysics Fellowship, and C.G., S.M., and M.S. from NSF Graduate Research Fellowships. Facilities: SZA, VLAAttached Files
Published - Muchovej2011p13682Astrophys_J.pdf
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Additional details
- Eprint ID
- 23507
- Resolver ID
- CaltechAUTHORS:20110429-111613223
- James S. McDonnell Foundation
- AST-0507545
- NSF
- AST-05-07161
- NSF
- University of Chicago
- AST-0604982
- NSF Division of Astronomical Sciences
- PHY-0114422
- NSF Physics Frontier Center
- HST-HF-51259.01
- NASA
- Created
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2011-05-03Created from EPrint's datestamp field
- Updated
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2021-11-09Created from EPrint's last_modified field