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| Paper: |
Massive Cluster Formation and Feedback Within the Galactic Centre |
| Volume: |
528, New Horizons in Galactic Center Astronomy and Beyond |
| Page: |
303 |
| Authors: |
Barnes, A. T.; Longmore, S. N.; Bigiel, F. |
| Abstract: |
Young massive clusters (YMCs) are the most compact stellar systems forming at the present day. The formation sites and early evolutionary stages of YMCs are, however, rare. The central several hundred parsecs of the Galactic Centre is an extreme environment, harbouring orders of magnitude higher average gas densities and external pressures than are typically seen in Disc star-forming regions. This is then the perfect environment in which to find massive molecular clouds that could form YMCs, as well as recently formed proto-YMCs. In this proceeding, we will discuss recent efforts to study the formation process of YMCs within the Galactic Centre, and the effect of this extreme environment on the subsequent feedback within young proto-YMCs (observed as H II region complexes). The first main result highlighted here is that YMCs form through via the “(wet-)conveyor-belt” mechanisms, whereby stars continually form within dispersed dense cores as the molecular cloud undergoes global gravitational collapse. This concurrent contraction of both the cluster-scale (1pc) gas and embedded (proto-)stars ultimately leads to the high (proto)stellar density in YMCs. The second result is that H II regions within the Galactic Centre appear to be still over-pressured with respect to their external ambient pressure. A comparison of H II regions within lower ambient pressure environments suggest that the maximum size of H II regions are set by the point of pressure equilibrium with the ambient medium - forcing Galactic Centre H II to be typically smaller for their number of high-mass stars compared to disk-like environments. |
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