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Trigonometric Parallaxes of High-mass Star-forming Regions: Our View of the Milky Way
Open accessAbstract
We compile and analyze approximately 200 trigonometric parallaxes and proper motions of molecular masers associated with very young high-mass stars. Most of the measurements come from the BeSSeL Survey using the VLBA and the Japanese VERA project. These measurements strongly suggest that the Milky Way is a four-arm spiral, with some extra arm segments and spurs. Fitting log-periodic spirals to the locations of the masers, allowing for “kinks” in the spirals and using well-established arm tangencies in the fourth Galactic quadrant, allows us to significantly expand our view of the structure of the Milky Way. We present an updated model for its spiral structure and incorporate it into our previously published parallax-based distance-estimation program for sources associated with spiral arms. Modeling the three-dimensional space motions yields estimates of the distance to the Galactic center, , the circular rotation speed at the Sun's position, km s −1 , and the nature of the rotation curve. Our data strongly constrain the full circular velocity of the Sun, km s −1 , and its angular velocity, km s −1 kpc –1 . Transforming the measured space motions to a Galactocentric frame which rotates with the Galaxy, we find non-circular velocity components typically ≲10 km s −1 . However, near the Galactic bar and in a portion of the Perseus arm we find significantly larger non-circular motions. Young high-mass stars within 7 kpc of the Galactic center have a scale height of only 19 pc, and thus are well suited to define the Galactic plane. We find that the orientation of the plane is consistent with the IAU-defined plane to within ±0.°1, and that the Sun is offset toward the north Galactic pole by pc. Accounting for this offset places the central supermassive black hole, Sgr A*, in the midplane of the Galaxy. The measured motions perpendicular to the plane of the Galaxy limit precession of the plane to ≲4 km s −1 at the radius of the Sun. Using our improved Galactic parameters, we predict the Hulse–Taylor binary pulsar to be at a distance of 6.54 ± 0.24 kpc, assuming its orbital decay from gravitational radiation follows general relativity.
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“Reid et al. ( 2019 ) report a distance of D = 8.15 ± 0.15 ( at 1 σ probability ) to the Galactic center, measured using trigonometric VLBI parallaxes of a large number ( ∼ 200 ) of masers.”
From First Sagittarius A* Event Horizon Telescope Results. IV. Variability, Morphology, and Black Hole Mass (2022) · cites this paper as Reid et al. (2019)
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“Using this distance measurement along with our measurement of θ g from Section 8.3.2 yields a constraint on the mass of Sgr A * of M = ´ -+ 4.0 10 0.6 1.1 6 M e , where we again quote 1 σ uncertainties and the systematic component is taken to be the weighted standard deviation across methods.”
From First Sagittarius A* Event Horizon Telescope Results. IV. Variability, Morphology, and Black Hole Mass (2022) · cites this paper as Reid et al. (2019)
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Metadata
- Authors
- Reid, M. J., Menten, K. M., Brunthaler, A., Zheng, X. W., Dame, T. M., Xu, Y., Li, J., Sakai, N., Wu, Y., Immer, K., Zhang, B., Sanna, A., Moscadelli, L., Rygl, K. L. J., Bartkiewicz, A., Hu, B., Quiroga-Nuñez, L. H., & van Langevelde, H. J.
- Affiliations
- Center for Astrophysics Harvard & Smithsonian (US)
- Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy (DE)
- Nanjing University (CN)
- Chinese Academy of Sciences (CN)
- Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute (KR)
- Joint Institute for VLBI ERIC (NL)
- Shanghai Astronomical Observatory (CN)
- Arcetri Astrophysical Observatory (IT)
- Istituto di Radioastronomia di Bologna (IT)
- Nicolaus Copernicus University (PL)
- Leiden University (NL)
- Venue
- The Astrophysical Journal
- Publisher
- American Astronomical Society
- Published
- 2019-11-07
- Volume
- 885
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 131
- ISSN
- 0004-637X (ISSN-L)
- 1538-4357
- OpenAlex
- W2986551855
- Cited by
- 760
- References
- 122
- Citations by year
- 2026: 90 · 2025: 152 · 2024: 116 · 2023: 108 · 2022: 118 · 2021: 100 · 2020: 73 · 2019: 3
- FWCI
- 39.58
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- The Astrophysical Journal (publishedVersion)
- arXiv (Cornell University) (submittedVersion)
- Leiden Repository (Leiden University) (submittedVersion)
- Data Archiving and Networked Services (DANS) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- arXiv (Cornell University)
- Funders
- European Commission (247078, 731016)
- National Natural Science Foundation of China (11933011, 2017YFA0402701, 11873019, 11673066)
- Chinese Academy of Sciences
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Stellar, planetary, and galactic studies
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Astrophysics and Star Formation Studies
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Astrophysical Phenomena and Observations
- Keywords
- stellar parallax, molecular masers, massive star formation, Milky Way spiral structure, galactocentric distance, galaxy rotation curves, proper motions, galactic bars, Sgr A*, Hulse-Taylor binary pulsar
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