Non-parametric method for measuring gas inhomogeneities from X-ray observations of galaxy clusters

We present a non-parametric method to measure inhomogeneities in the intracluster medium (ICM) from X-ray observations of galaxy clusters. Analysing mock Chandra X-ray observations of simulated clusters, we show that our new method enables the accurate recovery of the 3D gas density and gas clumping factor profiles out to large radii of galaxy clusters. We then apply this method to Chandra X-ray observations of Abell 1835 and present the first determination of the gas clumping factor from the X-ray cluster data. We find that the gas clumping factor in Abell 1835 increases with radius and reaches ~2-3 at r=R_{200}. This is in good agreement with the predictions of hydrodynamical simulations, but it is significantly below the values inferred from recent Suzaku observations. We further show that the radially increasing gas clumping factor causes flattening of the derived entropy profile of the ICM and affects physical interpretation of the cluster gas structure, especially at the large cluster-centric radii. Our new technique should be useful for improving our understanding of the cluster structure and to advance the use of galaxy clusters as cosmological probes, by helping to exploit rich data sets provided by Chandra and XMM-Newton X-ray space telescopes.