SEARCHING FOR THE 3.5 keV LINE IN THE STACKED SUZAKU OBSERVATIONS OF GALAXY CLUSTERS

Abstract

We perform a detailed study of the stacked Suzaku observations of 47 galaxy clusters, spanning a redshift range of 0.01–0.45, to search for the unidentified 3.5 keV line. This sample provides an independent test for the previously detected line. We detect a 2σ-significant spectral feature at 3.5 keV in the spectrum of the full sample. When the sample is divided into two subsamples (cool-core and non-cool core clusters), the cool-core subsample shows no statistically significant positive residuals at the line energy. A very weak (~2σ confidence) spectral feature at 3.5 keV is permitted by the data from the non-cool-core clusters sample. The upper limit on a neutrino decay mixing angle of sin[superscript 2](2θ) = 6.1 x 1[superscript -11] from the full Suzaku sample is consistent with the previous detections in the stacked XMM-Newton sample of galaxy clusters (which had a higher statistical sensitivity to faint lines), M31, and Galactic center, at a 90% confidence level. However, the constraint from the present sample, which does not include the Perseus cluster, is in tension with previously reported line flux observed in the core of the Perseus cluster with XMM-Newton and Suzaku.