The intracluster light on Frontier Fields clusters Abell 370 and Abell S1063

TL;DR

This study measures the intracluster light in two galaxy clusters using Hubble data and a novel algorithm, revealing insights into their dynamical states and stellar populations.

Contribution

Introduces the CICLE algorithm to measure ICL fractions without prior assumptions, linking ICL properties to cluster dynamics.

Findings

ICL fractions range from 7% to 25% in Abell 370.

ICL fractions range from 3% to 22% in Abell S1063.

Enhanced ICL in F606W suggests younger or lower-metallicity stars.

Abstract

We analyzed the contribution of the intracluster light (ICL) to the total luminosity of two massive galaxy clusters observed by the Hubble Space Telescope within the Frontier Fields program, Abell 370 (z ~ 0.375) and Abell S1063 (z ~ 0.348), in order to correlate it with the dynamical stage of these systems.We applied an algorithm based on the Chebyshev-Fourier functions called CICLE, specially developed to disentangle the ICL from the light of galaxies and measure the ICL fraction. We measured the ICL fraction in three broadband optical filters, F435W, F606W, and F814W, without assuming any prior hypothesis about the ICL physical properties or morphology. The results obtained from the ICL fraction vary between ~7% - 25%, and ~3% - 22% for both A370 and AS1063, respectively, which are consistent with theoretical predictions for the total amount of ICL obtained by ICL formation and evolution simulations.We found enhanced ICL fractions in the intermediate filter F606W for both clusters and we suggest that this is due to the presence of an excess of younger/lower-metallicity stars in the ICL compared to the cluster galaxies. We conclude that both Abell 370 and Abell S1063 are merging systems since they exhibit a similar feature as merging CLASH and Frontier Fields clusters sub-sample previously analyzed. We compare these results to the dynamical indicators obtained through different methods and we reinforce the use of ICL as a new and independent method to determine the dynamical state of clusters of galaxies.