English
Related papers

Related papers: Weighing the cusp at the Galactic Centre

200 papers

The orbital distribution of the S-star cluster surrounding the supermassive black hole in the center of the Milky Way is analyzed. A tight, roughly exponential dependence of the pericenter distance r$_{p}$ on orbital eccentricity…

Using 25 years of data from uninterrupted monitoring of stellar orbits in the Galactic Center, we present an update of the main results from this unique data set: A measurement of mass of and distance to SgrA*. Our progress is not only due…

In a dynamically relaxed cluster around a massive black hole a dense stellar cusp of old stars is expected to form. Previous observations showed a relative paucity of red giant stars within the central 0.5 pc in the Galactic Center. By…

We begin by presenting the analysis of a set of deep B- and V-band images of the central density cusp of the globular cluster M30 (NGC 7099), taken with the Faint Object Camera aboard the Hubble Space Telescope. These images are the first…

Astrophysics · Physics 2016-08-30 Craig Sosin

With 10 years of high-resolution imaging data now available on the stellar cluster in the Galactic Center, we analyze the dynamics of the stars at projected distances $\leq1.2''$ from the central black hole candidate Sagittarius A* (Sgr…

Astrophysics · Physics 2009-11-07 R. Schoedel , R. Genzel , T. Ott , A. Eckart

The Galactic centre Nuclear Star Cluster is one of the densest stellar clusters in the Galaxy. The stars in its inner portions orbit the supermassive black hole associated with compact radio source Sgr~A* at the orbital speeds of several…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2018-09-12 Michal Zajaček , Arman Tursunov

We use 23 years of astrometric and radial velocity data on the orbit of the star S0-2 to constrain a hypothetical intermediate-mass black hole orbiting the massive black hole Sgr A* at the Galactic center. The data place upper limits on…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2023-12-13 Clifford M. Will , Smadar Naoz , Aurélien Hees , Alexandria Tucker , Eric Zhang , Tuan Do , Andrea Ghez

The center of the Milky Way hosts a massive black hole. The observational evidence for its existence is overwhelming. The compact radio source Sgr A* has been associated with a black hole since its discovery. In the last decade,…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2010-02-08 S. Gillessen , F. Eisenhauer , H. Bartko , K. Dodds-Eden , T. K. Fritz , O. Pfuhl , T. Ott , R. Genzel

The hierarchical nature of galaxy formation suggests that a supermassive black hole binary could exist in our galactic center. We propose a new approach to constraining the possible orbital configuration of such a binary companion to the…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2025-07-11 Smadar Naoz , Clifford M. Will , Enrico Ramirez-Ruiz , Aurelien Hees , Andrea M. Ghez , Tuan Do

The region around the center of our Galaxy is very dense of stars. The kinematics of inner moving stars in the Galaxy (the so called S-stars) has been deeply studied by different research groups leading to the conclusion of the existence of…

General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology · Physics 2023-05-10 Roberto Capuzzo-Dolcetta , Matteo Sadun Bordoni

Motivated by recent observations that suggest a low density of old stars around the Milky Way supermassive black hole, models for the nuclear star cluster are considered that have not yet reached a steady state under the influence of…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2014-11-20 David Merritt

We present new SHARP/NTT stellar proper motion and accelaration data covering an interval from 1992 to 2000: 1) We combine the high precision but shorter time scale NIRC/Keck data with the lower precision but longer time scale SHARP/NTT…

Astrophysics · Physics 2009-11-07 A. Eckart , R. Genzel , T. Ott , R. Schoedel

(Abridged) We report on the structure of the nuclear star cluster in the innermost 0.16 pc of the Galaxy as measured by the number density profile of late-type giants. Using laser guide star adaptive optics in conjunction with the integral…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2010-02-10 Tuan Do , Andrea M. Ghez , Mark R. Morris , Jessica R. Lu , Keith Matthews , Sylvana Yelda , Shelley Wright , James Larkin

In this letter, we show that a massive black hole (MBH) which falls into the center of a galaxy in dynamical timescale leaves a weak cusp ($\rho \propto r^{-1/2}$) around it, which is in good agreement with the recent observations of…

Astrophysics · Physics 2009-10-31 Taro Nakano , Junichiro Makino

Observations of the S-stars, the cluster of young stars in the inner 0.1 pc of the Galactic Center, have been crucial in providing conclusive evidence for a supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy. Since some of the stars have…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2023-07-28 Sóley Ó. Hyman , Dimitrios Psaltis , Feryal Özel

We present proper motions for $>$40 stars at projected distances $\leq1.2''$ from Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*). We find evidence on a $\geq2\sigma$ level for radial anisotropy of the cluster of stars within $1''$ of Sgr A*. We find no evidence…

Astrophysics · Physics 2009-11-07 R. Schoedel , R. Genzel , T. Ott , A. Eckart , N. Mouawad , T. Alexander

The existence of stellar cusps in dense clusters around massive black holes is a fundamental, decades-old prediction of theoretical stellar dynamics. Yet, observational evidence has been difficult to obtain. With a new, improved analysis of…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2017-02-02 R. Schödel , P. Amaro-Seoane , E. Gallego-Cano

We study the long term dynamical evolution of stellar mass black holes (BHs) at the Galactic center (GC) and put constraints on their number and central mass distribution. Models of the GC are considered that have not yet achieved a steady…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2015-06-18 Fabio Antonini

We study the short-term effects of an intermediate mass black hole (IBH) on the orbit of star S2 (S02), the shortest-period star known to orbit the supermassive black hole (MBH) in the centre of the Milky Way. Near-infrared imaging and…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2015-05-19 Alessia Gualandris , Stefan Gillessen , David Merritt