CAIRNS: The Cluster and Infall Region Nearby Survey. I. Redshifts and mass profiles

The CAIRNS (Cluster and Infall Region Nearby Survey) project is a spectroscopic survey of the infall regions surrounding eight nearby, rich, X-ray-luminous clusters of galaxies. We have collected 15,654 redshifts (3471 new or remeasured) within similar to5-10 h(-1) Mpc of the centers of the clusters, making it the largest study of the infall regions of clusters. We determine cluster membership and the mass profiles of the clusters based on the phase-space distribution of the galaxies. All of the clusters display decreasing velocity dispersion profiles. The mass profiles are fitted well by functional forms based on numerical simulations but exclude an isothermal sphere. Specifically, NFW and Hernquist models provide good descriptions of cluster mass profiles to their turnaround radii. Our sample shows that the predicted infall pattern is ubiquitous in rich, X-ray-luminous clusters over a large mass range. The caustic mass estimates are in excellent agreement with independent X-ray estimates at small radii and with virial estimates at intermediate radii. The mean ratio of the caustic mass to the X-ray mass is 1.03+/-0.11, and the mean ratio of the caustic mass to the virial mass (when corrected for the surface pressure term) is 0.93+/-0.07. We further demonstrate that the caustic technique provides reasonable mass estimates even in merging clusters.