central molecular zone (CMZ) tagged posts

The Milky Way’s central molecular zone (CMZ) spans the innermost 1600 light-years of the galaxy (for comparison, the Sun is 26,600 light-years away from the galactic center) and includes a vast complex of molecular clouds containing about sixty million solar-masses of molecular gas. The gas in these clouds exists under more extreme physical conditions than elsewhere in the galaxy on average, with higher densities and temperatures, more intense pressures, magnetic fields, and turbulence, and higher cosmic-ray abundances and ultraviolet and X-ray radiation...

Spiral galaxy Messier 61, picture taken with the Hubble Space Telescope. Our Milky Way might look like this galaxy. Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA. Acknowledgements: G. Chapdelaine, L. Limatola, and R. Gendler

How does the gas in the centre of the Milky Way behave? Researchers from Heidelberg University, in collaboration with colleagues from the University of Oxford, recently investigated the motion of gas clouds in a comprehensive computer simulation. The new model finally makes it possible to conclusively explain this complex gas motion.

Our solar system is located in the outer regions of the Milky Way, a disk-shaped galaxy with an approximate diameter of 100,000 light years...