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Massive Stars and The Creation of our Galactic Center
Author(s) -
Figer Donald F.
Publication year - 2003
Publication title -
astronomische nachrichten
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.394
H-Index - 63
eISSN - 1521-3994
pISSN - 0004-6337
DOI - 10.1002/asna.200385060
Subject(s) - galactic center , stars , physics , astrophysics , astronomy , center (category theory) , chemistry , crystallography
Our Galactic Center hosts over 10% of the known massive stars in the Galaxy, the majority of which are located in three particularly massive clusters that formed within the past 5 Myr . While these clusters are extraordinary, their formation repesents about half of the total inferred star formation rate in the Galactic Center. There is mounting evidence that the clusters are just present‐day examples of the hundreds of such similar clusters that must have been created in the past, and whose stars now comprise the bulk of all stars seen in the region. I discuss the massive stellar content in the Galactic Center and present new data obtained with HST/NICMOS and Gemini AO, and an analysis that suggests that effects of continuous star formation in the Galactic Center can be seen in the observed luminosity functions.