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| Brightest Cluster Galaxy | |
|---|---|
| Name | Brightest Cluster Galaxy |
| Type | cD / E |
| Epoch | J2000 |
| Constellation | Various |
| Redshift | Various |
| Distance | Various |
| Mass | up to ~10^13 M☉ |
| Radius | up to ~1 Mpc |
| Notes | Central dominant galaxies in galaxy clusters |
Brightest Cluster Galaxy
Brightest Cluster Galaxy are the most luminous and massive galaxies located near the centers of galaxy clusters such as Virgo Cluster, Coma Cluster, and Perseus Cluster. They often occupy the potential minima of clusters observed in surveys by Sloan Digital Sky Survey, Chandra X-ray Observatory, and Hubble Space Telescope, and have been studied in the context of structure formation in the Lambda-CDM cosmology and by teams at institutions like Max Planck Society, Harvard–Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, and Space Telescope Science Institute.
BCG typically appear as giant elliptical or cD morphologies akin to galaxies cataloged in the New General Catalogue and are prominent in catalogs from the Two Micron All Sky Survey and the NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database. Surveys led by collaborations such as the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and instruments like the Very Large Telescope and Keck Observatory have established population statistics, luminosity functions, and scaling relations compared against simulations from groups at the Institute for Computational Cosmology and the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics.
Models for BCG assembly invoke hierarchical merging driven by dynamics in the Lambda-CDM cosmology and by processes studied in simulations such as the Millennium Simulation and the Illustris project. Major and minor mergers involving progenitors identified in the Two-degree Field Galaxy Redshift Survey and orbital decay due to dynamical friction described by work from Chandrasekhar are central, alongside cooling flows analyzed originally in studies by teams at University of Cambridge and California Institute of Technology. Feedback from active galactic nuclei hosted by supermassive black holes studied in the Event Horizon Telescope program and in observations by Chandra X-ray Observatory regulates star formation, as shown in papers by investigators at European Southern Observatory and National Radio Astronomy Observatory.
BCG exhibit extreme stellar masses comparable to central galaxies like M87 and NGC 4889, stellar velocity dispersions measured with instruments on Keck Observatory and Very Large Telescope, and extended envelopes similar to cD galaxy halos cataloged in the Catalogue of Galaxies and Clusters of Galaxies. Their supermassive black holes are studied in the context of the M–sigma relation with mass estimates from projects at Institute for Advanced Study and Max Planck Institute for Astronomy. Photometric profiles match de Vaucouleurs or Sersic fits used by teams at Carnegie Institution for Science and kinematic studies reference rotation curves from Sloan Digital Sky Survey data.
BCG often sit at the centers of clusters characterized in X-ray by the ROSAT and Chandra X-ray Observatory surveys and in Sunyaev–Zel'dovich effect studies by instruments such as the Atacama Cosmology Telescope and South Pole Telescope. They contribute to the baryon budget evaluated by collaborations at Planck (spacecraft) and participate in gravitational lensing signals exploited by the Hubble Space Telescope Frontier Fields and by teams at the European Southern Observatory to map dark matter halos comparable to results from the Dark Energy Survey and the Canada–France–Hawaii Telescope.
The interaction between BCG and the intracluster medium is evident through cavities, shocks, and ripples seen in observations by Chandra X-ray Observatory and radio jets tracked by arrays like the Very Large Array and Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array. Cooling flows in clusters such as Perseus Cluster and feedback cycles involving radio-mode AGN outbursts are central to models developed at Harvard–Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics and MIT, while multiphase gas and star formation in BCG are investigated by groups at Space Telescope Science Institute and European Southern Observatory.
BCG are identified by luminosity and central location in catalogs from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, Two Micron All Sky Survey, and the Two-degree Field Galaxy Redshift Survey, and by X-ray peaks in data from Chandra X-ray Observatory and XMM-Newton. Their spectra show absorption lines measured by spectrographs on Keck Observatory and Very Large Telescope while emission lines associated with AGN activity are compared against data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and radio surveys by the National Radio Astronomy Observatory.
Prominent examples include central galaxies such as those in the Perseus Cluster (host of NGC 1275), the giant ellipticals M87 in the Virgo Cluster and NGC 4889 in the Coma Cluster, as well as the cD galaxy in Abell 2029 studied with Chandra X-ray Observatory and Hubble Space Telescope. Case studies from the Hubble Space Telescope Frontier Fields, analyses by the European Southern Observatory, and simulation comparisons from the Illustris project and Millennium Simulation illustrate the interplay of mergers, AGN feedback explored by the Event Horizon Telescope and intracluster dynamics characterized by projects such as the Dark Energy Survey.
Category:Galaxies