Primordial magnetic fields with X-ray and S-Z cluster survey

TL;DR

This paper investigates how primordial magnetic fields influence galaxy cluster counts in X-ray and S-Z surveys, providing constraints on their amplitude and demonstrating the potential of S-Z surveys to detect magnetic fields of a few nano Gauss.

Contribution

It introduces a method to constrain primordial magnetic fields using galaxy cluster surveys and quantifies the sensitivity of S-Z surveys like SPT to these fields.

Findings

Primordial magnetic fields >10 nGauss are inconsistent with X-ray cluster data.

S-Z surveys can constrain magnetic fields down to a few nano Gauss.

Primordial magnetic fields affect galaxy cluster abundance predictions.

Abstract

The effect of primordial magnetic fields on X-ray or S-Z galaxy cluster survey is investigated. After recombination, the primordial magnetic fields generate additional density fluctuations. Such density fluctuations enhance the number of galaxy clusters. Taking into account the density fluctuations generated by primordial magnetic fields, we calculate the number of galaxy clusters based on the Press-Schechter formalism. Comparing with the results of Chandra X-ray galaxy cluster survey, we found that the existence of primordial magnetic fields with amplitude larger than 10 nGuass would be inconsistent. Moreover, we show that S-Z cluster surveys also have a sensitivity to constrain primordial magnetic fields. Especially SPT S-Z cluster survey has a potential to constrain the primordial magnetic fields with several nano Gauss.