BRINGING OUR GALAXY'S CENTRAL SUPERMASSIVE BLACK HOLE AND ITS ENVIRONS INTO FOCUS WITH LASER GUIDE STAR ADAPTIVE OPTICS

摘要

In this paper, we present results from recent infrared, high-spatial-resolution studies on the Galactic center that have demonstrated the existence of a central supermassive black hole and revealed several unexpected properties of the stars in the central nuclear star cluster. These results provide the best evidence to date that supermassive black holes exist at the center of normal galaxies, that star formation does proceed in its vicinity despite the strong tidal fields, and that the giant star population does not have the predicted cusp distribution. Future observations of stellar orbits have the potential for detecting post-Newtonian effects in the short-period stars and should probe the distribution of orbital parameters at larger radii, which is key to understanding star and cusp formation around a central supermassive black hole.