Astronomers Produce the Largest Image Ever Taken of the Heart of the Milky Way.

The central region of our Milky Way, sometimes referred to as the "Bulge," remains something of an enigma to astronomers. Because it is densely packed with stars and clouds of dust and gas, capturing images of its interior has historically been very difficult. But with advances in radio astronomy over many decades, which can capture light that is otherwise blocked at visible wavelengths, astronomers have made some immensely fascinating finds there. In addition to the well-known supermassive black hole (SMBH), Sagittarius A*, there is chemistry at work that could shed light on the origins of life in our galaxy.

Using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), an international team of astronomers has captured the central region of the Milky Way in unprecedented detail. The image reveals a region measuring 650 light-years in diameter filled with a complex network of filaments composed of dense clouds of cosmic gas, known as the Central Molecular Zone (CMZ). As the largest ALMA image taken to date, the rich dataset will allow astronomers to examine the rich chemistry and how stars evolve in the most extreme region of our galaxy.

The research that led to this dataset was conducted by members of the ALMA CMZ Exploration Survey (ACES), a scientific collaboration of more than 160 scientists from more than 70 institutions across Europe, North and South America, Asia, and Australia. The ACES is dedicated to studying the cold gas and identifying chemical signatures in the CMZ, ranging from simple compounds (such as silicon monoxide) to complex organic molecules (such as hydrocarbons). Their work is described in a series of papers that were published in the *Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society*.

Source: www.universetoday.com

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