The galaxy luminosity function in clusters and the field

Abstract

We present the results from a CCD survey of the B-band luminosity function of nine clusters of galaxies, and compare them to published photographic luminosity functions of nearby poor clusters like Virgo and Fornax, and also to the field luminosity function. We derive a composite luminosity function by taking the weighted mean of all the individual cluster luminosity functions; this composite luminosity function is steep at bright and faint magnitudes and is shallow in-between. All clusters have luminosity functions consistent with this single composite function. This is true both for rich clusters like Coma and for poor clusters like Virgo. This same composite function is also individually consistent with the deep field luminosity functions found by Cowie et al. and Ellis et al., and also with the faint end of the Las Campanas Redshift Survey R-band luminosity function, shifted by 1.5 mag. A comparison with the Loveday et al. field luminosity function, which is well determined at the bright end, shows that the composite function, which fits the field data well fainter than MB=−19, drops too steeply between MB=−19 and −22 to fit the field data there.