Sardinia Radio Telescope wide-band spectral-polarimetric observations of the galaxy cluster 3C 129

TL;DR

This study used the Sardinia Radio Telescope to produce high-frequency, wide-band spectral-polarimetric images of galaxy cluster 3C 129, revealing detailed spectral and polarization properties and estimating the source's age and motion.

Contribution

First wide-band spectral-polarimetric observations of 3C 129 at high frequencies with detailed beam correction and polarization analysis, providing new insights into the source's spectral aging and dynamics.

Findings

Estimated radiative age of 3C 129 is approximately 267 million years.

3C 129 is moving at a supersonic Mach number of 1.47.

Detected high polarization levels up to 70% in the source.

Abstract

We present new observations of the galaxy cluster 3C 129 obtained with the Sardinia Radio Telescope in the frequency range 6000-7200 MHz, with the aim to image the large-angular-scale emission at high-frequency of the radio sources located in this cluster of galaxies. The data were acquired using the recently-commissioned ROACH2-based backend to produce full-Stokes image cubes of an area of 1 deg x 1 deg centered on the radio source 3C 129. We modeled and deconvolved the telescope beam pattern from the data. We also measured the instrumental polarization beam patterns to correct the polarization images for off-axis instrumental polarization. Total intensity images at an angular resolution of 2.9 arcmin were obtained for the tailed radio galaxy 3C 129 and for 13 more sources in the field, including 3C 129.1 at the galaxy cluster center. These data were used, in combination with literature data at lower frequencies, to derive the variation of the synchrotron spectrum of 3C 129 along the tail of the radio source. If the magnetic field is at the equipartition value, we showed that the lifetimes of radiating electrons result in a radiative age for 3C 129 of t_syn = 267 +/- 26 Myrs. Assuming a linear projected length of 488 kpc for the tail, we deduced that 3C 129 is moving supersonically with a Mach number of M=v_gal/c_s=1.47. Linearly polarized emission was clearly detected for both 3C 129 and 3C 129.1. The linear polarization measured for 3C 129 reaches levels as high as 70% in the faintest region of the source where the magnetic field is aligned with the direction of the tail.