D. Trevese et al., A NONPARAMETRIC ANALYSIS OF THE LUMINOSITY FUNCTION OF CLUSTER GALAXIES, Astrophysical letters & communications, 33(1-5), 1996, pp. 177-180
Photographic F band photometry of a sample of 36 Abell clusters, has b
een used to study possible systematic differences between the luminosi
ty functions of galaxies belonging to clusters of different Rood & Sas
try type. A Kolmogorov-Smirnov two-sample test shows that the average
luminosity functions of clusters of various type differ in a statistic
ally significant way. In particular core and linear clusters appears i
ntermediate between cD and flat or irregular clusters. Our results app
ear consistent with the cannibalism model, where the luminosity functi
on evolves through a merging process which affects preferentially the
bright end of their luminosity function.