Radio Properties of Brightest Cluster Members
  We searched the literature for radio images and fluxes of brightest cluster
members (BCMs) in 1169 Abell clusters, selected on the basis of their BM or RS
type or on textual notes in the Abell catalog indicating the presence of
dominant galaxies. We inspected the images of existing radio surveys (NVSS,
SUMSS, FIRST, WENSS, etc.) and used the CATS and VizieR catalog browsers, as
well as additional literature, to collect radio fluxes and radio morphologies
for 1423 BCMs. We found 578 (41%) of these BCMs with detected radio emission,
of which 223 are detected at only a single frequency. Using the survey images
and published high-resolution images, we estimated the best available position
angle for the innermost radio structure and for the largest angular size of
each source. DSS images were used to obtain the orientation of the optical
major axis of the outer envelope of the BCMs, and the acute difference angle
between major optical and radio axes was derived for 102 objects. Its
distribution shows a similar bimodality as reported previously for a larger BCM
sample, although KS tests do not distinguish them from uniform ones. The shape
of the distribution is independent of optical ellipticity, optical
morphological type and largest linear radio size of the objects. In order to
find further clusters with dominant central galaxies, the above-mentioned
criteria need to be relaxed. There is at most marginal evidence for a relation
between powerful high-redshift radio galaxies and dominant galaxies of low-z
clusters when comparing their radio-optical alignment angle. We plan to derive
radio spectra, radio luminosities and search for possible relations between
these parameters and the radio-optical alignment, as well as to relate their
radio morphologies with the available BCM peculiar velocities.
