Reconciling 3D Models for the Central 10 pc of the Milky Way

Elisabeth A.C Mills; Natalie O Butterfield; Hauyu Baobab Liu; Dani Lipman; Adam Ginsburg; Mattia C Sormani; Jonathan D Henshaw; Cara D Battersby; Ashley T Barnes; Simon C. O Glover; Francisco Nogueras-Lara; Mark R Morris; Juergen Ott; Cornelia Lang; Claire Cook; Xinyu Mai

doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ae4d3a

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Reconciling 3D Models for the Central 10 pc of the Milky Way

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Reconciling 3D Models for the Central 10 pc of the Milky Way

Elisabeth A.C Mills, Natalie O Butterfield, Hauyu Baobab Liu, Dani Lipman, Adam Ginsburg, Mattia C Sormani, Jonathan D Henshaw, Cara D Battersby, Ashley T Barnes, Simon C. O Glover, …

The Astrophysical journal, Vol.1001(2), 184

04/20/2026

DOI: 10.3847/1538-4357/ae4d3a

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Abstract

The construction of an accurate 3D model of the Milky Way center is necessary to understand inflow processes that drive its overall evolution and to compare our Galactic nucleus to other galaxies’ nuclei. A main point of contention is the line-of-sight location of sources observed toward the central 10 pc of the Galaxy, including recent star formation (the Sgr A East supernova remnant and Sgr A H II regions) and copious gas (the 50 and 20 km s−1 molecular clouds, the circumnuclear disk, and the Sgr A West ionized “minispiral” that encircles the central supermassive black hole, Sgr A*). Some models place all of these structures within a radius of 5 pc from Sgr A*, while others place the 20 and 50 km s−1 clouds at a distance of at least 30−50 pc away from Sgr A* along the line of sight. We present new radio and millimeter observations of the molecular gas toward the central ∼10 pc, from which we have constructed an alternative 3D model that is consistent with both prior radio observations and orbital gas kinematics. Our model places the 20 km s−1 cloud, 50 km s−1 cloud, and Sgr A East more than 10 pc in front of Sgr A*. While this model does not conclusively rule out a connection between the 50 and 20 km s−1 clouds and the circumnuclear disk, we argue that prior evidence for these connections is tenuous, especially given the complex spatial and kinematic overlap of structures along the line of sight.

Radio Astronomy

Black holes

Galactic nuclei

Galaxies

H II regions

Kinematics

Line of sight

Milky Way

Molecular clouds

Molecular gases

Radio observation

Star & galaxy formation

Star formation

Supermassive black holes

Supernova

Supernova remnants

Three dimensional models

Details

Title: Subtitle: Reconciling 3D Models for the Central 10 pc of the Milky Way
Creators: Elisabeth A.C Mills - University of Kansas
Natalie O Butterfield - National Radio Astronomy Observatory
Hauyu Baobab Liu - National Taiwan Normal University
Dani Lipman - University of Connecticut
Adam Ginsburg - University of Florida
Mattia C Sormani - University of Insubria
Jonathan D Henshaw - Liverpool John Moores University
Cara D Battersby - University of Connecticut
Ashley T Barnes - European Southern Observatory
Simon C. O Glover - Heidelberg University
Francisco Nogueras-Lara - Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía
Mark R Morris - University of California, Los Angeles
Juergen Ott - National Radio Astronomy Observatory
Cornelia Lang - University of Iowa
Claire Cook - University of Kansas
Xinyu Mai - University of Kansas
Resource Type: Journal article
Publication Details: The Astrophysical journal, Vol.1001(2), 184
DOI: 10.3847/1538-4357/ae4d3a
ISSN: 0004-637X
eISSN: 1538-4357
Publisher: IOP Publishing
Grant note: National Science Foundation (NSF): 1813765, 2115428, 2206509, and CAREER 2339670
We thank the referee of this paper for their constructive comments that strengthened our analysis and its presentation in this paper. E.A.C.M. gratefully acknowledges funding from the National Science Foundation under award Nos. 1813765, 2115428, 2206509, and CAREER 2339670 and through the SOFIA archival research program under award No. 09_0205. C.D.B. gratefully acknowledges funding from the National Science Foundation under award Nos. 2108938, 2206510, and CAREER 2145689, as well as from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration through the Astrophysics Data Analysis Program under award "3-D MC: Mapping Circumnuclear Molecular Clouds from X-ray to Radio," grant No. 80NSSC22K1125. A.G. acknowledges support from the NSF under AAG 2206511 and CAREER 2142300. M.C.S. acknowledges financial support from the European Research Council under the ERC Starting Grant "GalFlow" (grant 101116226) and from Fondazione Cariplo under the grant ERC attrattivita No. 2023-3014. F.N.-L. gratefully acknowledges financial support from grant PID2024-162148NA-I00, funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) "A way of making Europe"; from the Ramon y Cajal program (RYC2023-044924-I), funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and FSE+; and from the Severo Ochoa grant CEX2021-001131-S, funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033.
Language: English
Date published: 04/20/2026
Academic Unit: Liberal Arts and Science Admin; Physics and Astronomy
Record Identifier: 9985153515302771

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