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The mass distribution and gravitational potential of the Milky Way
Open accessAbstract
We present mass models of the Milky Way created to fit observational constraints and to be consistent with expectations from theoretical modelling. The method used to create these models is that demonstrated in our previous study, and we improve on those models by adding gas discs to the potential, considering the effects of allowing the inner slope of the halo density profile to vary, and including new observations of maser sources in the Milky Way amongst the new constraints. We provide a best-fitting model, as well as estimates of the properties of the Milky Way. Under the assumptions in our main model, we find that the Sun is R0 = 8.20 ± 0.09 kpc from the Galactic Centre, with the circular speed at the Sun being v0 = 232.8 ± 3.0 km s−1; and that the Galaxy has a total stellar mass of (54.3 ± 5.7) × 109 M⊙, a total virial mass of (1.30 ± 0.30) × 1012 M⊙ and a local dark-matter density of 0.40 ± 0.04 GeV cm−3, where the quoted uncertainties are statistical. These values are sensitive to our choice of priors and constraints. We investigate systematic uncertainties, which in some cases may be larger. For example, if we weaken our prior on R0, we find it to be 7.97 ± 0.15 kpc and that v0 = 226.8 ± 4.2 km s−1. We find that most of these properties, including the local dark-matter density, are remarkably insensitive to the assumed power-law density slope at the centre of the dark-matter halo. We find that it is unlikely that the local standard of rest differs significantly from that found under assumptions of axisymmetry. We have made code to compute the force from our potential, and to integrate orbits within it, publicly available.
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“Such studies argue that the Galactic halo has a very high concentration, typically ∼ 14 or higher”
From The milky way total mass profile as inferred from Gaia DR2 (2020) · cites this paper as McMillan 2017
Experimental — accuracy not yet measuredThe source backs part of the claim, not all of it — or backs it for a different population, condition or comparison.
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“This stellar mass is in good agreement with estimates for the MW (e.g. Bovy & Rix 2013; McMillan 2017, and Section 5)”
From The milky way total mass profile as inferred from Gaia DR2 (2020) · cites this paper as McMillan 2017
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“and even more flexible formulae, such as the generalised NFW profile (gNFW, which has been used to model the MW halo - McMillan 2017; Karukes et al. 2019b), struggle to describe the radial profile of the contracted halo.”
From The milky way total mass profile as inferred from Gaia DR2 (2020) · cites this paper as McMillan 2017
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“They correspond to an HI mass of 1 . 1 × 10 10 M ⊙ and a molecular gas mass of 10 percent of the HI mass.”
From The milky way total mass profile as inferred from Gaia DR2 (2020) · cites this paper as McMillan 2017
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Cites
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“As a test, we have also used the affine invariant MCMC sampler proposed byGoodman & Weare(2010), and packaged asemcee by Foreman-Mackey et al.(2013), to explore the pdf of some of our models, and found essentially identical results.”
ResultSEVEN-YEAR WILKINSON MICROWAVE ANISOTROPY PROBE(WMAP) OBSERVATIONS: COSMOLOGICAL INTERPRETATION
Komatsu, E., Smith, K. M., Dunkley, J., Bennett, C. L., Gold, B., Hinshaw, G., Jarosik, N., Larson, D., Nolta, M. R., Page, L., et al. (2011) · The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series · doi:10.1088/0067-0049/192/2/18 · Cited by 8,802 · cited 1×
“The critical density is ρcrit = 3H2 8πG (6) where we takeH = 70.4 km s−1 Mpc−1 from Komatsu et al.(2011).”
BackgroundInfluentialThe Structure of Cold Dark Matter Halos
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Prusti, T., de Bruijne, J. H. J., Brown, A. G. A., Vallenari, A., Babusiaux, C., Bailer‐Jones, C. A. L., Bastian, U., Biermann, M., Evans, D. W., Eyer, L., et al. (2016) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/201629272 · Cited by 7,350
THE SEVENTH DATA RELEASE OF THE SLOAN DIGITAL SKY SURVEY
Abazajian, K. N., Adelman-McCarthy, J. K., Agüeros, M. A., Allam, S. S., Prieto, C. A., An, D., Anderson, K. S. J., Anderson, S. F., Annis, J., Bahcall, N. A., et al. (2009) · The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series · doi:10.1088/0067-0049/182/2/543 · Cited by 5,341 · cited 1×
“…‘hole’ in the stellar density for the same reasons given in Paper I. TheJurić et al.(2008) analysis of data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS:Abazajian et al. 2009) showed that the approximation to exponential profiles is a sensible one for the Milky Way, and produced estimates based on…”
MethodSimulations of the formation, evolution and clustering of galaxies and quasars
Springel, V., White, S. D. M., Jenkins, A. R., Frenk, C. S., Yoshida, N., Gao, L., Navarro, J. F., Thacker, R. J., Croton, D., Helly, J. C., et al. (2005) · Nature · doi:10.1038/nature03597 · Cited by 5,060 · cited 1×
“The relationship betweenM∗ and Mv was determined by ‘abundance matching’ of the galaxy stellar masses found byLi & White (2009) with the halo virial masses found in the Millennium simulations (Springel et al. 2005; Boylan-Kolchin et al. 2009).”
MethodEnsemble samplers with affine invariance
Goodman, J. B., & Weare, J. (2010) · Communications in Applied Mathematics and Computational Science · doi:10.2140/camcos.2010.5.65 · Cited by 3,075
corner.py: Scatterplot matrices in Python
Foreman-Mackey, D. T. (2016) · The Journal of Open Source Software · doi:10.21105/joss.00024 · Cited by 2,183 · cited 1×
“The corner plots were created with thecorner.py package (Foreman-Mackey 2016).”
MethodLocal kinematics and the local standard of rest
Schönrich, R. A., Binney, J. J., & Dehnen, W. (2010) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1111/j.1365-2966.2010.16253.x · Cited by 1,934 · cited 5×
“…a R0 in an axisymmetric approximation of the true potential (i.e. what we find in this study), and the velocity of a closed orbit,and therefore a theoretical 0 km s−1 dispersion population, in the Solar neighbourhood (which is what is found by local measurementslike that of Schönrich et al. 2010).”
BackgroundMethodInfluential
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High-speed stars: Galactic hitchhikers
Caffau, E., Monaco, L., Bonifacio, P., Sbordone, L., Haywood, M., Spite, M., Matteo, P. D., Spite, F., Mucciarelli, A., François, P., et al. (2020) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202038057 · Cited by 15
“Five stars in the sample (GHS22, GHS33, GHS37, GHS58, and GHS64) return positive total energies E, and are thus unbound in the McMillan (2017) potential (total virial mass 1.3× 1012 M ), while all the other stars belong to the Galactic halo, with the majority on retrograde orbits (44/72) and only…”
BackgroundMethodInfluentialKoop, O., Antoja, T., Helmi, A., Callingham, T. M., & Laporte, C. F. P. (2024) · Astronomy & Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202450911 · Cited by 14
Cameron, A. D., Bailes, M., Champion, D. J., Freire, P. C. C., Kramer, M., McLaughlin, M. A., Ng, C., Possenti, A., Ridolfi, A., Tauris, T. M., et al. (2023) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stad1712 · Cited by 14
Searching for Milky Way twins: Radial abundance distribution as a strict criterion
Pilyugin, L. S., Tautvaišienė, G., & Lara-López, M. A. (2023) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202346503 · Cited by 18
Exploring the chemodynamics of metal-poor stellar populations
da Silva, A. R., & Smiljanić, R. (2023) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202347229 · Cited by 15
Investigating the amplitude and rotation of the phase spiral in the Milky Way outer disc
Alinder, S., McMillan, P. J., & Bensby, T. (2023) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202346560 · Cited by 14
Self-citationThe Spectacular Tidal Tails of Globular Cluster M3 (NGC 5272)
Yang, Y., Zhao, J., Tang, X.-Z., Ye, X., & Zhao, G. (2023) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/acdee2 · Cited by 14
Improved bounds on the bosonic dark matter with pulsars in the Milky Way
Liang, D., & Shao, L. (2023) · Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics · doi:10.1088/1475-7516/2023/08/016 · Cited by 14
“J C A P 0 8 ( 2 0 2 3 ) 0 1 6 When calculating the orbit, we have made use of the best fitting Galactic potential model of the Milky Way [93], in which the DM density distribution is modeled by the Navarro-FrenkWhite profile [96] , ρDM(r) = ρ0,h (r/rh)γ(1 + 3r/rh)3−γ , (2.3) where γ = 1, and rh = 18.6 kpc is the scale…”
MethodInfluentialGaspari, N., Levan, A. J., Chrimes, A. A., & Nelemans, G. (2023) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stad3259 · Cited by 21
Signatures of Tidal Disruption of the Hercules Ultrafaint Dwarf Galaxy*
Ou, X., Chiti, A., Shipp, N., Simon, J. D., Geha, M., Frebel, A., Mardini, M. K., Erkal, D., & Necib, L. (2024) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ad2f27 · Cited by 14
Efficient and Accurate Force Replay in Cosmological-baryonic Simulations
Arora, A., Sanderson, R. E., Regan, C., Garavito-Camargo, N., Bregou, E., Panithanpaisal, N., Wetzel, A. R., Cunningham, E. C., Loebman, S., Dropulic, A., et al. (2024) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ad88f0 · Cited by 14
Tidal tails of nearby open clusters
Risbud, D., Jadhav, V. V., & Kroupa, P. (2025) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202453302 · Cited by 14
Characterisation of local halo building blocks: Thamnos and Sequoia
Dodd, E., Ruiz-Lara, T., Helmi, A., Gallart, C., Callingham, T. M., Cassisi, S., Fernández-Alvar, E., & Surot, F. (2025) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202451978 · Cited by 14
Stellar encounters with giant molecular clouds
Kokaia, G., & Davies, M. B. (2019) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stz813 · Cited by 17
“Some tests were also conducted using other potentials, such as Paczynski (1990) and McMillan (2017).”
MethodSearching for solar siblings in APOGEE and Gaia DR2 with N-body simulations
Webb, J. J., Price-Jones, N., Bovy, J., Zwart, S. P., Hunt, J. D., Mackereth, J. T., & Leung, H. W. (2020) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/staa788 · Cited by 13
“To incorporate the uncertainty in each action calculation due to the assumed Galactic potential, we also calculate actions assuming stars orbit in the Milky Way model proposed by McMillan (2017).”
MethodMetzger, P. T., Grundy, W. M., Sykes, M. V., Stern, S. A., Bell, J. F., III, Detelich, C. E., Runyon, K. D., & Summers, M. E. (2021) · Icarus · doi:10.1016/j.icarus.2021.114768 · Cited by 22
PBH assisted search for QCD axion dark matter
Choi, G., & Schiappacasse, E. D. (2022) · Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics · doi:10.1088/1475-7516/2022/09/072 · Cited by 14
“Taking into account (1) tidal disruption in the Milky Way, (2) a total number of 8× 108 NSs distributed in the galactic disk and bulge, (3) a galactic model which complies with theoretical modelling and fits observational constraints [84], and (4) UCMHs undergoing circular orbits around the”
MethodHow close dark matter haloes and MOND are to each other: three-dimensional tests based on Gaia DR2
Zhu, Y., Ma, H.-X., Dong, X.-B., Huang, Y., Mistele, T., Peng, B., Long, Q., Wang, T., Chang, L., & Jin, X. (2022) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stac3483 · Cited by 14
The LMC impact on the kinematics of the Milky Way satellites: clues from the running solar apex
Makarov, D. I., Александрович, Х. С., Makarova, L. N., Makarova, L., Libeskind, N. I., & Salomon, J.-B. (2023) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stad757 · Cited by 14
Micro-X Sounding Rocket: Transitioning from First Flight to a Dark Matter Configuration
Adams, J. S., Anderson, A. J., Baker, R., Bandler, S. R., Bastidon, N., Castro, D., Danowski, M. E., Doriese, W. B., Eckart, M. E., Figueroa-Feliciano, E., et al. (2020) · Journal of Low Temperature Physics · doi:10.1007/s10909-019-02307-2 · Cited by 14
Dark matter substructure under the electron scattering lamppost
Buch, J., Buen-Abad, M. A., Fan, J., & Leung, J. S. C. (2020) · Physical review. D/Physical review. D. · doi:10.1103/physrevd.102.083010 · Cited by 14
The FAST Globular Cluster Pulsar Survey (GC FANS)
Lian, Y., Pan, Z., Zhang, H., Cao, S., Freire, P. C. C., Qian, L., Eatough, R. P., Shao, L., Ransom, S. M., Lorimer, D. R., et al. (2025) · The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series · doi:10.3847/1538-4365/ade4ba · Cited by 13
Discovery of an [Fe/H] ∼ −4.8 Star in Gaia XP Spectra *
Limberg, G., Placco, V. M., Ji, A. P., Yao, Y., Chiti, A., Mardini, M. K., Frebel, A., & Rossi, S. (2025) · The Astrophysical Journal Letters · doi:10.3847/2041-8213/adf196 · Cited by 19
Placco, V. M., Limberg, G., Chiti, A., Prabhu, D. S., Ji, A. P., Barbosa, F. O., Cerny, W., Pace, A. B., Stringfellow, G. S., Sand, D. J., et al. (2025) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/adf846 · Cited by 18
Ding, H., Deller, A. T., Fonseca, E., Stairs, I. H., Stappers, B. W., & Lyne, A. G. (2021) · The Astrophysical Journal Letters · doi:10.3847/2041-8213/ac3091 · Cited by 13
“Following Zhu et al. (2018), we estimated Ṗ Galb with different Galactic mass distribution models compiled in GalPot (https://github.com/PaulMcMillan-Astro/ GalPot, McMillan 2017).”
MethodInfluentialVirial Clumps in Central Molecular Zone Clouds
Myers, P. C., Hatchfield, H. P., & Battersby, C. (2022) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ac5906 · Cited by 13
Mass-loss and composition of wind ejecta in type I X-ray bursts
Herrera, Y., Sala, G., & José, J. (2023) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202346190 · Cited by 13
New dipole instabilities in spherical stellar systems
Weinberg, M. D. (2023) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stad2591 · Cited by 13
Deceleration of kicked objects due to the Galactic potential
Disberg, P. H. W., Gaspari, N., & Levan, A. J. (2024) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202449996 · Cited by 17
Wempe, E., Lavaux, G., White, S. D. M., Helmi, A., Jasche, J., & Stopyra, S. (2024) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202450975 · Cited by 13
Kinematic constraints on the ages and kick velocities of Galactic neutron star binaries
Disberg, P., Gaspari, N., & Levan, A. J. (2024) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202450790 · Cited by 13
Distributions and collision rates of ALP stars in the Milky Way
Maseizik, D., & Günter Sigl, A. (2024) · Physical review. D/Physical review. D. · doi:10.1103/physrevd.110.083015 · Cited by 13
“43 · 10 12 M ⊙ is the DM halo mass taken from the fits of [51].”
BackgroundAwad, P., Li, T. S., Erkal, D., Peletier, R. F., Bunte, K., Koposov, S. E., Li, A., Balbinot, E., Smith, R., Canducci, M., et al. (2024) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202451930 · Cited by 13
Viswanathan, A., Yuan, Z., Arentsen, A., Starkenburg, E., Martin, N. F., Youakim, K., Ibata, R., Sestito, F., Matsuno, T., Prieto, C. A., et al. (2025) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202450819 · Cited by 16
Discovery and Spectroscopic Confirmation of Aquarius III: A Low-mass Milky Way Satellite Galaxy
Cerny, W., Chiti, A., Geha, M., Mutlu-Pakdı̇l, B., Drlica-Wagner, A., Tan, C. Y., Adamów, M., Pace, A. B., Simon, J. D., Sand, D. J., et al. (2025) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ad8eba · Cited by 22
Metallicity and α-abundance for 48 Million Stars in Low-extinction Regions in the Milky Way
Hattori, K. (2025) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ad9686 · Cited by 13
Giant Primeval Magnetic Dipoles
Thompson, C. (2017) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/aa7684 · Cited by 13
“Here we have used values for the local Milky Way dark matter density, ρdm ≃ 7× 10−25 g cm−3, and circular speed Vc = 230 km s −1, taken from McMillan (2017).”
MethodA preferential attachment model for the stellar initial mass function
Cisewski-Kehe, J., Weller, G. B., & Schafer, C. (2019) · Electronic Journal of Statistics · doi:10.1214/19-ejs1556 · Cited by 13
“The Milky Way is home to billions of stars (McMillan, 2016), many of which are members of stellar clusters - gravitationally bound collections of stars.”
BackgroundLopes, J., Lacroix, T., & Lopes, I. P. (2021) · Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics · doi:10.1088/1475-7516/2021/01/073 · Cited by 13
“[141], and representative of a cored halo.”
BackgroundInfluentialSDSS-IV MaNGA: the ‘G-dwarf problem’ revisited
Greener, M. J., Merrifield, M. R., Aragón‐Salamanca, A., Peterken, T., Andrews, B. H., & Lane, R. R. (2021) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Letters · doi:10.1093/mnrasl/slab012 · Cited by 13
“Like their kin the Milky Way – a galaxy of stellar mass ∼5×1010 M (McMillan 2017) – they show a G-dwarf problem, which, comparison to Figure 1 confirms, is resolved if these systems are modelled as accreting boxes.”
BackgroundSearch for Dark Matter Annihilation Signals from Unidentified Fermi-LAT Objects with H.E.S.S.
Abdalla, H., Aharonian, F., Benkhali, F. A., Angüner, E. O., Arcaro, C., Armand, C., Armstrong, T. P., Ashkar, H., Backes, M., Baghmanyan, V., et al. (2021) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/abff59 · Cited by 13
“Alternative Galactic mass models can be used to describe subhalo parameters for MW-like galaxies (Catena & Ullio 2010; McMillan 2011; Stref & Lavalle 2017; McMillan 2017).”
MethodFermi bubbles: the collimated outburst needed to explain forward-shock edges
Mondal, S., Keshet, U., Sarkar, K. C., & Gurwich, I. (2022) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stac1084 · Cited by 13
High-velocity Stars in SDSS/APOGEE DR17
Quispe-Huaynasi, F., Roig, F., McDonald, D. J., Loaiza-Tacuri, V., Majewski, S. R., Wanderley, F., Cunha, K., Pereira, C. B., Hasselquist, S., & Daflon, S. (2022) · The Astronomical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-3881/ac90bc · Cited by 13
Multi-TeV dark matter density in the inner Milky Way halo: spectral and dynamical constraints
Zuriaga-Puig, J., Gammaldi, V., Gaggero, D., Lacroix, T., & Sánchez-Conde, M. Á. (2023) · Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics · doi:10.1088/1475-7516/2023/11/063 · Cited by 13
“1 ◦ of H.E.S.S. values given by numerical simulations (Table 1) and the blue and brown regions correspond to the McMillan17 [46] and Benito20 [1] models (1 σ and 2 σ regions), given by observations.”
InfluentialUncovering the orbit of the hercules dwarf galaxy
Gregory, A. L., Collins, M., Erkal, D., Tollerud, E. J., Delorme, M., Hill, L., Sand, D. J., Strader, J., & Willman, B. (2020) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/staa1553 · Cited by 13
“Based on the mass estimate for Hercules provided in §3.1.1, we can also estimate the tidal radius of Hercules in the potential from McMillan (2017).”
BackgroundMethodInfluentialSynthetic observations of spiral arm tracers of a simulated Milky Way analog
Reissl, S., Stil, J. M., Chen, E., Treß, R. G., Sormani, M. C., Smith, R. J., Klessen, R. S., Buick, M., Glover, S. C. O., Shanahan, R., et al. (2020) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202037690 · Cited by 13
“We assign disk gas densities according to the HI thin and thick disk components of McMillan (2017) to be consistent with our analytic potential.”
MethodConstraints on the electron-to-proton mass ratio variation at the epoch of reionization
Levshakov, S. A., Kozlov, M. G., & Agafonova, I. I. (2020) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/staa2635 · Cited by 13
“E-mail: lev@astro.ioffe.ru that the total matter (and the gravitational potential) within the solar circle is dominated by baryons with ρb/ρDM ∼ 10, where ρb is the baryon density and ρDM is the density of dark matter (DM) (McGaugh 2018; McMillan 2017; Iocco et al. 2015; Sofue et al. 2009).”
BackgroundSynthetic observations of spiral arm tracers of a simulated Milky Way analog
Reißl, S., Stil, J. M., Chen, E., Treß, R. G., Sormani, M. C., Smith, R. J., Klessen, R. S., Buick, M., Glover, S. C. O., Shanahan, R., et al. (2020) · Research Explorer (The University of Manchester) · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202037690/pdf · Cited by 13
Das, P., Huang, Y., Ciucă, I., & Fragkoudi, F. (2023) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stad3344 · Cited by 12
Hammer, F., Wang, J., Mamon, G. A., Pawlowski, M. S., Yang, Y., Jiao, Y., Li, H., Bonifacio, P., Caffau, E., & Wang, H. (2023) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stad2922 · Cited by 12
Heiger, M., Li, T.-S., Pace, A., Simon, J., Ji, A. P., Chiti, A., Bom, C., Carballo-Bello, J., Carlin, J., Cerny, W., et al. (2023) · Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ad0cf7 · Cited by 11
Accurate computation of the screening of scalar fifth forces in galaxies
Burrage, C., March, B., & Naik, A. P. (2024) · Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics · doi:10.1088/1475-7516/2024/04/004 · Cited by 12
“5 × 10 12 M ⊙ [56].”
BackgroundComparing bulge RR Lyrae stars with bulge giants
Carvajal, J. O., Zoccali, M., Leo, M. D., Ramos, R. C., Quezada, C., Rojas-Arriagada, Á., Valenti, E., Albarracín, R., & Navarro, Á. V. (2024) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202449503 · Cited by 12
Could very low-metallicity stars with rotation-dominated orbits have been driven by the bar?
Yuan, Z., Li, C., Martin, N. F., Monari, G., Famaey, B., Siebert, A., Chiba, R., Arentsen, A., Sestito, F., Thomas, G. F., et al. (2024) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202348593 · Cited by 19
The earliest phases of CNO enrichment in galaxies
Rossi, M., Romano, D., Mucciarelli, A., Ceccarelli, E., Massari, D., & Zamorani, G. (2024) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202451189 · Cited by 16
Searching accretion-enhanced dark matter annihilation signals in the Galactic Centre
Yang, M., Guo, Z., Luo, X.-Y., Shen, Z.-Q., Xia, Z.-Q., Lu, C.-T., Tsai, Y.-L. S., & Fan, Y.-Z. (2024) · Journal of High Energy Physics · doi:10.1007/jhep10(2024)094 · Cited by 12
On N-body simulations of globular cluster streams
Banik, N., & Bovy, J. (2021) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stab886 · Cited by 12
Radio timing constraints on the mass of the binary pulsar PSR J1528−3146
Berthereau, A., Guillemot, L., Freire, P. C. C., Kramer, M., Krishnan, V. V., Cognard, I., Theureau, G., Bailes, M., Bernadich, M. C. I., & Lower, M. E. (2023) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202346228 · Cited by 12
LMC-driven Anisotropic Boosts in Stream–Subhalo Interactions
Arora, A., Garavito-Camargo, N., Sanderson, R. E., Cunningham, E. C., Wetzel, A. R., Panithanpaisal, N., & Barry, M. (2024) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ad7375 · Cited by 12
“Moreover, since the orientation of the LMC orbit and the orbit is not well-constrained due to uncertainties in measured positions and proper motion and in MW mass models (McMillan 2016; Pietrzyński et al. 2019), our simulation with a differently oriented LMC-analog provides a plausible scenario.”
MethodThe shapes and alignments of the satellites of the Milky Way and Andromeda
Sanders, J. L., & Evans, N. W. (2017) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stx2116 · Cited by 12
“Tidal effects are naturally more significant in M31 due to its more massive disc – McMillan (2017) estimates the total stellar mass of MW as M∗ = (5.4 ± 0.6) × 1010 M whilst Chemin, Carignan & Foster (2009) estimates the total stellar mass of M31 as M∗ = (9.5 ± 1.7) × 1010 M .”
BackgroundInfluentialTesting Weyl gravity at galactic and extra-galactic scales
Dutta, K., & Islam, T. (2018) · Physical review. D/Physical review. D. · doi:10.1103/physrevd.98.124012 · Cited by 12
Koppelman, H. H., Hagen, J. H. J., & Helmi, A. (2021) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202039390 · Cited by 12
“We note that the quoted percentages here are specific to the McMillan (2017) potential.”
BackgroundMethodInfluentialThe historical record of massive star formation in Cygnus
Comerón, F., Djupvik, A. A., Schneider, N., & Pasquali, A. (2020) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202039188 · Cited by 11
“We adopt the parameters obtained by McMillan (2017): V0 = 232.8 km s−1, distance of the Sun to the galactic center R0 = 8.20 kpc, and components of the velocity of the Sun with respect to the local standard of rest (U ,V ,W ) = (11.10, 12.24, 7.25) km s−1, where the three components of the velocity…”
MethodInfluentialEvidence for Multiple Accretion Events in the Gaia-Sausage/Enceladus Structures
Kim, Y. K., Lee, Y. S., Beers, T. C., & Koo, J. (2021) · The Astrophysical Journal Letters · doi:10.3847/2041-8213/abf35e · Cited by 13
Absence of obvious tidal tails around the globular cluster NGC 6397
Boldrini, P., & Vitral, E. (2021) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stab2035 · Cited by 12
“Figure 1 compares our MWmodel with other MW potentials from the literature (Bovy 2015; McMillan 2017; Irrgang et al. 2013).”
BackgroundWeighing the Galactic disk using phase-space spirals
Widmark, A., Hunt, J. D., Laporte, C. F. P., & Monari, G. (2022) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202243173 · Cited by 12
Fujimoto, Y., Inutsuka, S., & Baba, J. (2023) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stad1612 · Cited by 16
Limits on dark matter annihilation in prompt cusps from the isotropic gamma-ray background
Delos, M. S., Korsmeier, M., Widmark, A., Blanco, C., Linden, T., & White, S. D. M. (2024) · Physical review. D/Physical review. D. · doi:10.1103/physrevd.109.083512 · Cited by 15
The Magellanic Clouds Are Very Rare in the IllustrisTNG Simulations
Haslbauer, M., Banik, I., Kroupa, P., Zhao, H., & Asencio, E. (2024) · Universe · doi:10.3390/universe10100385 · Cited by 11
The TW Hydrae Association is a cluster chain of Sco-Cen
Miret-Roig, N., Alves, J., Ratzenböck, S., Galli, P. A. B., Bouy, H., Figueras, F., Großschedl, J. E., Meingast, S., Posch, L., Rottensteiner, A., et al. (2025) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202452558 · Cited by 11
Thomas, G. F., Battaglia, G., Grand, R. J. J., & Álvarez, A. A. (2025) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202452449 · Cited by 18
Testing gravity with interstellar precursor missions
Banik, I., & Kroupa, P. (2019) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stz1508 · Cited by 11
“(5) Kinematic observations of our Galaxy imply a particular value for gext, which we get from the Local Standard of Rest parameters obtained by McMillan (2017).”
MethodConnecting the Local Stellar Halo and Its Dark Matter Density to Dwarf Galaxies via Blue Stragglers
Casagrande, L. (2020) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ab929f · Cited by 11
PSR J2234+0611: A new laboratory for stellar evolution
Stovall, K., Freire, P. C. C., Antoniadis, J., Bagchi, M., Deneva, J. S., Garver-Daniels, N., Martinez, J. G., McLaughlin, M. A., Arzoumanian, Z., Blumer, H., et al. (2024) · Repository of the Academy's Library (Library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences) · doi:10.25916/sut.26296003.v1 · Cited by 11
Smiljanić, R., Zych, M. G., & Pasquini, L. (2020) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202039101 · Cited by 11
“For the calculations, we adopted the the best-fit Galactic model found by McMillan (2017).”
MethodInfluentialImportant stellar perturbers found during the StePPeD database update based on Gaia EDR3 data
Dybczyński, P. A., Berski, F., Tokarek, J., Podlewska-Gaca, E., Langner, K., & Bartczak, P. (2022) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202243853 · Cited by 11
Bandyopadhyay, A., Sivarani, T., Beers, T. C., Susmitha, A., Nayak, P. K., & Pandey, J. C. (2022) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ac8b0f · Cited by 12
Constraining Sterile Neutrino Dark Matter in the Milky Way Halo with Swift-XRT
Sicilian, D., Lopez, D., Moscetti, M., Bülbül, E., & Cappelluti, N. (2022) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ac9fcf · Cited by 11
The individual abundance distributions of disc stars across birth radii in GALAH
Wang, K., Carrillo, A., Ness, M., & Buck, T. (2023) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stad3182 · Cited by 11
NGC 307 and the effects of dark-matter haloes on measuring supermassive black holes in disc galaxies
Erwin, P., Thomas, J., Saglia, R. P., Fabricius, M., Rusli, S. P., Seitz, S., & Bender, R. (2017) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stx2499 · Cited by 11
“Tonry & Davis (1981) reported a central velocity dispersion of 325 ± 15 km s−1, but more modern measurements indicate significantly lower values: σ e = 239 km s−1 has been reported by van den Bosch et al. (2015), and Saglia et al. (2016) estimated σ e = 205 km s−1, based on the kinematic and imaging data presented in…”
ResultInfluentialThe reduced proper motion selected halo: Methods and description of the catalogue
Koppelman, H. H., & Helmi, A. (2020) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202038178 · Cited by 11
“…v j, , (14) using v`, = −U sin ` + (V + vLSR) cos `, (15) vb, = W cos b − sin b · (U cos ` + (V + vLSR) sin `), (16) where we use the Schönrich et al. (2010) solar motion (U ,V ,W ) = (11.1, 12.24, 7.25) km s−1 and the McMillan (2017) motion of the local standard of rest (LSR) vLSR = 232.8 km s−1.”
MethodInfluentialUsing heritability of stellar chemistry to reveal the history of the Milky Way
Jackson, H., Jofré, P., Yaxley, K. J., Das, P., Silva, D. D. B., & Foley, R. (2021) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/staa4028 · Cited by 11
“With this information, we determine the three actions (the radial action Jr, the vertical action Jz, and the z component of angular momentum) using the action finding-package in AGAMA (Vasiliev 2019) and assuming the most probable Milky Way gravitational potential found in McMillan (2017).”
MethodThe GALAH Survey: No Chemical Evidence of an Extragalactic Origin for the Nyx Stream
Zucker, D. B., Simpson, J. D., Martell, S. L., Lewis, G. F., Casey, A. R., Ting, Y.-S., Horner, J., Nordlander, T., Wyse, R. F. Ġ., Zwitter, T., et al. (2021) · The Astrophysical Journal Letters · doi:10.3847/2041-8213/abf7cd · Cited by 11
G 112-43/44: A metal-poor binary star with a unique chemical composition and Helmi stream kinematics
Nissen, P. E., Silva, J., & Schuster, W. J. (2021) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202140826 · Cited by 11
“Article number, page 2 of 9 motion relative to the LSR to (U⊙, V⊙, W⊙) = (11.1, 12.24, 7.25) km s−1 (Schönrich et al. 2010) and the circular speed of the LSR to 232.8 km s−1(McMillan 2017).”
BackgroundInfluentialBoettner, C., Dayal, P., Trebitsch, M., Libeskind, N. I., Rice, K., Cockell, C. S., & Tieleman, B. I. (2024) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202449557 · Cited by 10
Aganze, C., Pearson, S., Starkenburg, T., Contardo, G., Johnston, K. V., Tavangar, K., Price-Whelan, A. M., & Burgasser, A. J. (2024) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ad159c · Cited by 10
Rains, A. D., Nordlander, T., Monty, S., Casey, A. R., Rojas-Ayala, B., Žerjal, M., Ireland, M., Casagrande, L., & McKenzie, M. (2024) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stae560 · Cited by 10
First spiral arm detection using dynamical mass measurements of the Milky Way disk
Widmark, A., & Naik, A. P. (2024) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202449199 · Cited by 12
The R -Process Alliance: Analysis of limited- r stars
Xylakis-Dornbusch, T., Hansen, T. T., Beers, T. C., Christlieb, N., Ezzeddine, R., Frebel, A., Holmbeck, E. M., Placco, V. M., Roederer, I. U., Sakari, C. M., et al. (2024) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202449376 · Cited by 12
An ‘alien’ called the Oosterhoff dichotomy?
Luongo, E., Ripepi, V., Marconi, M., Prudil, Z., Rejkuba, M., Clementini, G., & Longo, G. (2024) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202451596 · Cited by 10
Thirty-five Years of Timing of M53A with Arecibo and FAST
Lian, Y., Freire, P. C. C., Cao, S., Cadelano, M., Pallanca, C., Pan, Z., Zhang, H., Li, B., & Qian, L. (2025) · The Astrophysical Journal Letters · doi:10.3847/2041-8213/adb153 · Cited by 10
Early Coformation of the Milky Way’s Thin and Thick Disks at Redshift z > 2
Borbolato, L., Rossi, S., Perottoni, H. D., Limberg, G., Amarante, J. A. S., Queiroz, A. B. A., Chiappini, C., Anders, F., Santucci, R. M., Barbosa, F. O., et al. (2025) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ae0c96 · Cited by 14
Huang, Y.-H., Hirashita, H., Hsu, Y.-H., Lin, Y., Nelson, D., & Cooper, A. P. (2020) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/staa3695 · Cited by 10
“%) with mean halo mass 𝑀200 = 2.37 × 1012M (roughly consistent with empirical constraints, e.g. Boylan-Kolchin et al. 2013; McMillan 2017).”
BackgroundInfluentialNon-parametric spherical Jeans mass estimation with B-splines
Rehemtulla, N., Valluri, M., & Vasiliev, E. (2022) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stac400 · Cited by 13
Characterization and dynamics of the peculiar stream Jhelum
Woudenberg, H. C., Koop, O., Balbinot, E., & Helmi, A. (2022) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202243266 · Cited by 10
Where are the extremely metal-poor stars in the Milky Way and Andromeda? Expectations from TNG50
Chen, L., Pillepich, A., Glover, S. C. O., & Klessen, R. S. (2022) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stac3554 · Cited by 10
New stellar velocity substructures from Gaia DR3 proper motions
Mikkola, D., McMillan, P. J., & Hobbs, D. (2022) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stac3649 · Cited by 10
Self-citationUntangling the Sources of Abundance Dispersion in Low-metallicity Stars
Griffith, E. J., Johnson, J. A., Weinberg, D. H., Ilyin, I. V., Johnson, J. W., Martínez, R. R., & Strassmeier, K. G. (2023) · The Astrophysical Journal · doi:10.3847/1538-4357/aca659 · Cited by 10
Hypernova signatures of the first stars in dwarf galaxies in the local group
Lee, T., Jeon, M., & Bromm, V. (2023) · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society · doi:10.1093/mnras/stad3198 · Cited by 10
Evaporation ages: A new dating method for young star clusters
Pelkonen, V.-M., Miret-Roig, N., & Padoan, P. (2024) · Astronomy and Astrophysics · doi:10.1051/0004-6361/202348611 · Cited by 10
Metadata
- Authors
- McMillan, P. J.
- Affiliations
- Lund University (SE)
- Corresponding author
- McMillan, Paul J.
- ORCID
- McMillan, Paul J.
- Venue
- Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
- Publisher
- Oxford University Press (OUP)
- Published
- 2016-10-26
- Volume
- 465
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 76-94
- ISSN
- 0035-8711 (ISSN-L)
- 1365-2966
- OpenAlex
- W2485876312
- Cited by
- 1,099
- References
- 128
- Citations by year
- 2026: 104 · 2025: 165 · 2024: 154 · 2023: 126 · 2022: 120 · 2021: 121 · 2020: 118 · 2019: 88 · 2018: 64 · 2017: 36 · 2016: 3
- FWCI
- 30.41
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- arxiv.org
- Locations
- Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society (publishedVersion)
- arXiv (Cornell University) (submittedVersion)
- Lund University Publications (Lund University) (submittedVersion)
- HighWire Press Open Archive (submittedVersion)
- arXiv (Cornell University)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Galaxies: Formation, Evolution, Phenomena
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Stellar, planetary, and galactic studies
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Astrophysical Phenomena and Observations
- Keywords
- Milky Way mass distribution, gravitational potential, dark matter halos, stellar mass, virial mass, local dark matter density, local standard of rest, halo density profiles, gas discs, orbit integration, axial symmetry
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