We present a study on the origin of the metallicity evolution of the intra-cluster medium ( ICM ) by applying a semi-analytic model of galaxy formation to N -body/SPH ( smoothed particle hydrodynamic ) non-radiative numerical simulations of clusters of galaxies .
The semi-analytic model includes gas cooling , star formation , supernovae feedback and metal enrichment , and is linked to the diffuse gas of the underlying simulations so that the chemical properties of gas particles are dynamically and consistently generated from stars in the galaxies .
This hybrid model let us have information on the spatial distribution of metals in the ICM .
The results obtained for a set of clusters with virial masses of \sim 1.5 \times 10 ^ { 15 } h ^ { -1 } { M } _ { \odot } contribute to the theoretical interpretation of recent observational X -ray data , which indicate a decrease of the average iron content of the intra-cluster gas with increasing redshift .
We find that this evolution arises mainly as a result of a progressive increase of the iron abundance within \sim 0.15 R _ { vir } .
The clusters have been considerably enriched by z \sim 1 with very low contribution from recent star formation .
Low entropy gas that has been enriched at high redshift sinks to the cluster centre contributing to the evolution of the metallicity profiles .