Bibcode
Bovy, J.; Bird, J. C.; García Pérez, A. E.; Majewski, S. R.; Nidever, D. L.; Zasowski, G.
Bibliographical reference
The Astrophysical Journal, Volume 800, Issue 2, article id. 83, 12 pp. (2015).
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2
2015
Journal
Citations
79
Refereed citations
75
Description
We investigate the kinematics of stars in the mid-plane of the Milky Way
(MW) on scales between 25 pc and 10 kpc with data from the Apache Point
Observatory Galactic Evolution Experiment (APOGEE), the Radial Velocity
Experiment (RAVE), and the Geneva-Copenhagen survey (GCS). Using
red-clump (RC) stars in APOGEE, we determine the large-scale
line-of-sight velocity field out to 5 kpc from the Sun in (0.75
kpc)2 bins. The solar motion V ☉ – c
with respect to the circular velocity Vc is the largest
contribution to the power on large scales after subtracting an
axisymmetric rotation field; we determine the solar motion by minimizing
the large-scale power to be V ☉ – c = 24
± 1 (ran.) ± 2 (syst. [Vc ]) ± 5
(syst.[large-scale]) km s–1, where the systematic
uncertainty is due to (1) a conservative 20 km s–1
uncertainty in Vc and (2) the estimated power on unobserved
larger scales. Combining the APOGEE peculiar-velocity field with RC
stars in RAVE out to 2 kpc from the Sun and with local GCS stars, we
determine the power spectrum of residual velocity fluctuations in the
MW's disk on scales between 0.2 kpc–1 <= k <= 40
kpc–1. Most of the power is contained in a broad peak
between 0.2 kpc–1 < k < 0.9
kpc–1. We investigate the expected power spectrum for
various non-axisymmetric perturbations and demonstrate that the central
bar with commonly used parameters but of relatively high mass can
explain the bulk of velocity fluctuations in the plane of the Galactic
disk near the Sun. Streaming motions ≈10 km s–1 on
>~ 3 kpc scales in the MW are in good agreement with observations of
external galaxies and directly explain why local determinations of the
solar motion are inconsistent with global measurements.