The ROSAT Brightest Cluster Sample — IV. The extended sample

Abstract

We present a low-flux extension of the X-ray-selected ROSAT Brightest Cluster Sample (BCS) published in Paper I of this series. Like the original BCS and employing an identical selection procedure, the BCS extension is compiled from ROSAT All-Sky Survey (RASS) data in the northern hemisphere (δ≥0°) and at high Galactic latitudes (|b|≥20°). It comprises 99 X-ray-selected clusters of galaxies with measured redshifts z≤0.3 (as well as eight more at z>0.3) and total fluxes between 2.8×10−12 and 4.4×10−12 erg cm−2 s−1 in the 0.1–2.4 keV band (the latter value being the flux limit of the original BCS). The extension can be combined with the main sample published in 1998 to form the homogeneously selected extended BCS (eBCS), the largest and statistically best understood cluster sample to emerge from the RASS to date. The nominal completeness of the combined sample (defined with respect to a power-law fit to the bright end of the BCS log N−log S distribution) is relatively low at 75 per cent (compared with 90 per cent for the high-flux sample of Paper I). However, just as for the original BCS, this incompleteness can be accurately quantified, and thus statistically corrected for, as a function of X-ray luminosity and redshift. In addition to its importance for improved statistical studies of the properties of clusters in the local Universe, the low-flux extension of the BCS is also intended to serve as a finding list for X-ray-bright clusters in the northern hemisphere which we hope will prove useful in the preparation of cluster observations with the next generation of X-ray telescopes such as Chandra and XMM-Newton. An electronic version of the eBCS can be obtained from the following URL: http://www.ifa.hawaii.edu/∼ebeling/clusters/BCS.html.