An international research team led by Dr. ZHANG Suinan from the Shanghai Astronomical Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has uncovered the unique mechanisms governing star formation in the Central Molecular Zone (CMZ) of the Milky Way.
Using observations from the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), the team’s findings, published on March 13 in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, show that turbulent conditions in the Galactic Center suppress the formation of massive stars through a fragmented, hierarchical star formation process.
The CMZ, which contains tens of millions of solar masses of gas at the heart of the Galaxy, produces far fewer stars than expected. While previous studies linked this anomaly to the chaotic environment of the…