The absolute proper motions of the Arches and Quintuplet clusters

Abstract

Arches and Quintuplet are two young, massive clusters projected near the Galactic Center. To date, studies focused on understanding their origin have been based on proper motions (PMs) derived in the clusters' reference frames and required some assumptions about their 3D motion. In this paper, we combine public PM catalogs of these clusters with the Gaia DR2 catalog and, for the first time, transform the relative PMs of the Arches and Quintuplet clusters onto an absolute reference system. We find that the absolute PM of the Arches is $({\mu }_{\alpha }\cos \delta ,{\mu }_{\delta })$ $=$ $(-1.45\pm 0.23,-2.68\pm 0.14)$ mas yr${}^{-1}$, and that of the Quintuplet is $({\mu }_{\alpha }\cos \delta ,{\mu }_{\delta })$ $=$ $(-1.19\pm 0.09,-2.66\pm 0.18)$ mas yr${}^{-1}$. These values suggest that these systems are moving almost parallel to the Galactic plane. A measurement of the clusters' distances is still required to meaningfully constrain the clusters' orbits and shed light on the origin of the Arches and Quintuplet.

arXiv comment9 pages, 8 figures, accepted for publication in MNRAS. v2: Fixed Bibliography

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• 2D kinematics of massive stars near the Galactic Center
• Chandra large-scale mapping of the Galactic center: Probing high-energy structures around the central molecular zone
• Measuring the Orbits of the Arches and Quintuplet Clusters using HST and Gaia: Exploring Scenarios for Star Formation Near the Galactic Center
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