We present deep XMM-Newton, Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array, and upgraded Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope observations of Abell 746, a cluster that hosts a plethora of diffuse emission sources that provide evidence for the acceleration of relativistic particles. Our new XMM-Newton images reveal a complex morphology of the thermal gas with several substructures. We observe an asymmetric temperature distribution across the cluster: the southern regions exhibit higher temperatures, reaching ∼9 keV, while the northern regions have lower temperatures (≤4 keV), likely due to a complex merger. We find evidence of three surface brightness edges and one candidate edge, of which three are merger-driven shock fronts. Combining our new data with published LOw-Frequency ARray observations has unveiled the nature of diffuse sources in this system. The bright NW relic shows thin filaments and a high degree of polarization with aligned magnetic field vectors. We detect a density jump, aligned with the fainter relic to the north. To the south, we detect high-temperature regions, consistent with the shock-heated regions and a density jump coincident with the northern tip of the southern radio structure. Its integrated spectrum shows a high-frequency steepening. Lastly, we find that the cluster hosts large-scale radio halo emission. A comparison of the thermal and nonthermal emission reveals an anticorrelation between the bright radio and X-ray features at the center. Our findings suggest that Abell 746 is a complex system that involves multiple mergers.
Abell 746: A Highly Disturbed Cluster Undergoing Multiple Mergers
- Creators
- Rajpurohit, K.
- Lovisari, L.
- Botteon, A.
- Jones, C.
- Forman, W.
- O'Sullivan, E.
- van Weeren, R. J.
- HyeongHan, K.
- Bonafede, A.
- Jee, M. J.
- Vazza, F.
- Brunetti, G.
- Cho, H.
- Domínguez-Fernández, P.
- Stroe, A.
- Finner, K.
- Brüggen, M.
- Vrtilek, J. M.
- David, L. P.
- Schellenberger, G.
- Wittman, D.
- Lusetti, G.
- Kraft, R.
- De Gasperin, F.
Abstract
Copyright and License
© 2024. The Author(s). Published by the American Astronomical Society. Original content from this work may be used under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence. Any further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and DOI.
Acknowledgement
We thank the anonymous referee for a constructive report. K.R., W.F., and C.J. acknowledge support from the Smithsonian Institution and NASA 80NSSC22K1621. K.R. and F.V. acknowledge the ERC starting grant "MAGCOW" No. 714196. L.L. acknowledges financial contribution from the INAF grant 1.05.12.04.01. R.J.v.W. acknowledges support from the ERC Starting grant ClusterWeb 804208. A.B. acknowledges support from the ERC through grant ERC-Stg DRANOEL No. 714245. M.J.J. acknowledges support for the current research from the National Research Foundation (NRF) of Korea under the programs 2022R1A2C1003130 and RS-2023-00219959. P.D.F. acknowledges the support of a Future Faculty Leaders Fellowship. A.S. acknowledges the support of a Clay Fellowship. This work is based on observations obtained with XMM-Newton, an ESA science mission with instruments and contributions directly funded by ESA Member States and the US (NASA). The National Radio Astronomy Observatory is a facility of the National Science Foundation operated under cooperative agreement by Associated Universities. The GMRT is run by the National Centre for Radio Astrophysics (NCRA) of the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR). LOFAR (van Haarlem et al. 2013) is the Low-Frequency Array designed and constructed by ASTRON. It has observing, data processing, and data storage facilities in several countries, which are owned by various parties (each with their own funding sources), and that are collectively operated by the ILT foundation under a joint scientific policy. The ILT resources have benefited from the following recent major funding sources: CNRS-INSU, Observatoire de Paris and Université d'Orléans, France; BMBF, MIWF-NRW, and MPG, Germany; Science Foundation Ireland (SFI) and Department of Business, Enterprise and Innovation (DBEI), Ireland; NWO, The Netherlands; The Science and Technology Facilities Council, UK; Ministry of Science and Higher Education, Poland; and The Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica (INAF), Italy. This research made use of the LOFAR-UK computing facility located at the University of Hertfordshire and supported by STFC [ST/P000096/1], of the LOFAR-IT computing infrastructure supported and operated by INAF, and by the Physics Dept. of Turin University (under the agreement with Consorzio Interuniversitario per la Fisica Spaziale) at the C3S Supercomputing Centre, Italy.
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Additional details
- ISSN
- 1538-4357
- Smithsonian Institution
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- 80NSSC22K1621
- European Research Council
- 714196
- National Institute for Astrophysics
- 1.05.12.04.01
- European Research Council
- 804208
- European Research Council
- 714245
- National Research Foundation of Korea
- 2022R1A2C1003130
- National Research Foundation of Korea
- RS-2023-00219959
- Harvard University
- Science and Technology Facilities Council
- ST/P000096/1
- University of Turin
- Caltech groups
- Infrared Processing and Analysis Center (IPAC)