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Notes:
Clusters of galaxies as the largest dynamically evolved dark matter halos are the most direct probes of the cosmic evolution of the large-scale structure. Therefore, they provide an ideal census of the dynamics of large-scale structure and the embedded dark matter halo formation. While X-ray surveys of clusters have been quite successful, a search for galaxy clusters through the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (SZ) effect will be increasingly effective if we extend our search to larger redshifts, since the SZ-effect experiences no cosmological surface brightness dimming with distance.
The left images shows a simulated SZ 150 GHz one square degree map computed from numerical cosmological evolution simulations. For the right images, to those SZ decrements the primary CMB anisotropy was added, and the image was convolved with a 1 arcmin beam. This is the sky that the APEX SZ camera will look at. We can see that to a detection limit of about 50-100 micro K, we should be able to identify some 10 clusters per square degree.