Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 August 2006
We study fossil galaxy groups, their hot gas and the galaxy properties. Fossils are more X-ray luminous than non-fossil groups, however, they fall comfortably on the conventional L-T relation of galaxy groups and clusters indicating that their X-ray luminosity and temperature are both boosted, arguably, as a result of their early formation. The central dominant galaxy in fossils have optical luminosity comparable to the brightest cluster galaxies (BCGs), however, the isophotal shapes of the central galaxy in fossils are non-boxy in contrast to the isophotes of majority of the BCGs.