Chemical Characterization of the Galactic Center

Abstract

The Galactic center is a unique region in the center of the Milky Way, with the Nuclear Star Cluster (NSC) and the Nuclear Stellar Disk (NSD) embedded in the Central Molecular Zone. A promising approach to study these regions, is the analysis of abundance trends of a range of elements with different evolutionary timescales. Using high-resolution near-infrared spectroscopy, accurate elemental abundances can now be derived in the NSC and NSD. A powerful tool is to compare the trends from these populations with those from inner-bulge and thick-disk stars analyzed with the same methodology. In a few papers we have pioneered this approach finding enhanced alpha-element trends, indicating a high star formation rate, and similarities between the NSC and inner bulge, challenging previous models of recent dominant starbursts. These findings provide new insights into the formation history of the Milky Way’s central regions and emphasize the need for further high-resolution spectroscopic studies.