The Galactic Center Stars
Monday 26 April, 2:30 pm, Curia II
Milos Milosavljevic (Caltech)
@: milos AT its.caltech.edu

The discovery of hundreds of young, bright stars within a parsec from the
massive black hole at the Galactic center poses challenges to established
star formation theories. The densities required for gaseous gravitational
collapse are most naturally achieved in accretion disks. I exploit
analogies with the observed accretion disks in active galactic nuclei and
the inferred progenitor disks of extrasolar planetary systems to construct
a model for the formation and evolution of stars within the sphere of
influence of a massive black hole. I will present an astrophysical
justification for a continued monitoring of these stars.