Large-Scale Structure in the ROSAT North Ecliptic Pole Survey

Abstract

We have used the ROSAT All-Sky Survey around the North Ecliptic Pole to construct a complete sample of galaxy clusters. The deep and contiguous nature of the survey affords us the opportunity to examine large-scale structure in the Universe on scales of hundreds of megaparsecs. We have identified over 99% of the 446 X-ray sources in the survey area. The cluster sample consists of 65 objects with redshifts approaching unity. Surprisingly, some 20% of the clusters exists in a wall-like structure at z=0.088 spanning the entire 9 deg x 9 deg survey region. This is a very significant extension of both the membership and the spatial extent to a known supercluster in this location.