Decaying neutrinos in galaxy clusters

Abstract

Davidsen et al. (1991) have argued that the failure to detect uv photons from the dark matter DM) in cluster A665 excludes the decaying neutrino hypothesis. Sciama et al. (1993) argued that because of high central concentration the DM in that cluster must be baryonic. We study the DM profile in clusters of galaxies simulated using the Harrison--Zel'dovich spectrum of density fluctuations, and an amplitude previously derived from numerical simulations (Melott 1984b; Anninos et al. 1991) and in agreement with microwave background fluctuations (Smoot et al. 1992). We find that with this amplitude normalization cluster neutrino DM densities are comparable to observed cluster DM values. We conclude that given this normalization, the cluster DM should be at least largely composed of neutrinos. The constraint of Davidsen et al. can be somewhat weakened by the presence of baryonic DM; but it cannot be eliminated given our assumptions.