Evidence that pre-processing in filaments drives the anisotropic quenching of satellite galaxies in massive clusters

Abstract: We use a sample of 11 $z\approx0.2-0.5$ ($z_{\text{med.}} = 0.36$) galaxy clusters from the Cluster Lensing And Supernovae survey with Hubble (CLASH) to analyse the angular dependence of satellite galaxy colour $(B-R)$ and passive galaxy fraction ($f_{\text{pass.}}$) with respect to the major axis of the brightest cluster galaxy (BCG). This phenomenon has been dubbed as \say{anisotropic quenching}, \say{angular conformity} or \say{angular segregation}, and it describes how satellite galaxies along the major axis of the BCG are more likely to be quenched than those along the minor axis. A highly significant anisotropic quenching signal is found for satellites, with a peak in $(B-R)$ and $f_{\text{pass.}}$ along the major axis. We are the first to measure anisotropic quenching out to cluster-centric radii of $3R_{200}$ ($R_{200\text{, med.}} \approx 933$ \si{\kilo\parsec}). We find that the signal is significant out to at least $2.5R_{200}$, and the amplitude of the signal peaks at $\approx1.25R_{200}$. This is the first time a radial peak of the anisotropic quenching signal has been measured directly. We suggest that this peak could be caused by a build-up of backsplash galaxies at this radius. Finally, we find that $f_{\text{pass.}}$ is significantly higher along the major axis for fixed values of local surface density. The density drops less rapidly along the major axis and so satellites spend more time being pre-processed here compared to the minor axis. We therefore conclude that pre-processing in large-scale structure, and not active galactic nuclei outflows (AGN), is the cause of the anisotropic quenching signal in massive galaxy clusters, however this may not be the cause in lower mass halos.