Unbiased Correction Relations for Galaxy Cluster properties Derived from Chandra and XMM-Newton

TL;DR

This study investigates discrepancies in galaxy cluster properties derived from Chandra and XMM-Newton data, proposing correction relations based on temperature and mass to reconcile differences and improve measurement accuracy.

Contribution

The paper introduces unbiased correction relations for galaxy cluster temperature and mass measurements between Chandra and XMM-Newton, reducing biases and scatter.

Findings

Chandra temperatures are higher than XMM-Newton's, with a good linear relation.

Correcting Chandra mass with temperature relations reduces bias to 0.02.

Applying corrections improves the intrinsic scatter from 0.20 to 0.12.

Abstract

We use a sample of 62 clusters of galaxies to investigate the discrepancies of gas temperature and total mass within r500 between XMM-Newton and Chandra data. Comparisons of the properties show that: (1) Both the de-projected and projected temperatures determined by Chandra are higher than those of XMM-Newton and there is a good linear relation for the de-projected temperature. (2) The Chandra mass is much higher than XMM-Newton mass with a bias of 0.15. To explore the reasons for the discrepancy in mass, we recalculate the Chandra mass (expressed as M_c) by modifying its temperature with the de-projected temperature relation. The results show that M_c is more close to the XMM-Newton mass with the bias reducing to 0.02. Moreover, M_c are corrected with the r500 measured by XMM-Newton and the intrinsic scatter is significantly improved with the value reducing from 0.20 to 0.12. These mean that the temperature bias may be the main factor causing the mass bias. At last, we find that M_c is consistent with the corresponding XMM-Newton mass derived directly from our mass relation at a given Chandra mass. Thus, the de-projected temperature and mass relations can provide unbiased corrections for galaxy cluster properties derived from Chandra and XMM-Newton.