Dark Energy Survey Year 1 results: Detection of Intra-cluster Light at Redshift $\sim$ 0.25

Abstract: Using data collected by the Dark Energy Survey (DES), we report the detection of intracluster light (ICL) with $\sim300$ galaxy clusters in the redshift range of 0.2-0.3. We design methods to mask detected galaxies and stars in the images and stack the cluster light profiles, while accounting for several systematic effects (sky subtraction, instrumental point-spread function, cluster selection effects and residual light in the ICL raw detection from background and cluster galaxies). The methods allow us to acquire high signal-to-noise measurements of the ICL and central galaxies (CGs), which we separate with radial cuts. The ICL appears as faint and diffuse light extending to at least 1 Mpc from the cluster center, reaching a surface brightness level of 30 mag arcsec$^{-2}$. The ICL and the cluster CG contribute to $44\%\pm17$\% of the total cluster stellar luminosity within 1 Mpc. The ICL color is overall consistent with that of the cluster red sequence galaxies, but displays the trend of becoming bluer with increasing radius. The ICL demonstrates an interesting self-similarity feature -- for clusters in different richness ranges, their ICL radial profiles are similar after scaling with cluster $R_\mathrm{200m}$, and the ICL brightness appears to be a good tracer of the cluster radial mass distribution. These analyses are based on the DES redMaPPer cluster sample identified in the first year of observations.