2018A&A...615L..15G

Query : 2018A&A...615L..15G

2018A&A...615L..15G - Astronomy and Astrophysics, volume 615L15-15 (2018/7-1)

Detection of the gravitational redshift in the orbit of the star S2 near the Galactic centre massive black hole.

GRAVITY COLLABORATION, ABUTER R., AMORIM A., ANUGU N., BAUBOCK M., BENISTY M., BERGER J.P., BLIND N., BONNET H., BRANDNER W., BURON A., COLLIN C., CHAPRON F., CLENET Y., COUDE DU FORESTO V., DE ZEEUW P.T., DEEN C., DELPLANCKE-STROBELE F., DEMBET R., DEXTER J., DUVERT G., ECKART A., EISENHAUER F., FINGER G., FORSTER SCHREIBER N.M., FEDOU P., GARCIA P., GARCIA LOPEZ R., GAO F., GENDRON E., GENZEL R., GILLESSEN S., GORDO P., HABIBI M., HAUBOIS X., HAUG M., HAUSSMANN F., HENNING T., HIPPLER S., HORROBIN M., HUBERT Z., HUBIN N., JIMENEZ ROSALES A., JOCHUM L., JOCOU L., KAUFER A., KELLNER S., KENDREW S., KERVELLA P., KOK Y., KULAS M., LACOUR S., LAPEYRERE V., LAZAREFF B., LE BOUQUIN J.-B., LENA P., LIPPA M., LENZEN R., MERAND A., MULER E., NEUMANN U., OTT T., PALANCA L., PAUMARD T., PASQUINI L., PERRAUT K., PERRIN G., PFUHL O., PLEWA P.M., RABIEN S., RAMIREZ A., RAMOS J., RAU C., RODRIGUEZ-COIRA G., ROHLOFF R.-R., ROUSSET G., SANCHEZ-BERMUDEZ J., SCHEITHAUER S., SCHOLLER M., SCHULER N., SPYROMILIO J., STRAUB O., STRAUBMEIER C., STURM E., TACCONI L.J., TRISTRAM K.R.W., VINCENT F., VON FELLENBERG S., WANK I., WAISBERG I., WIDMANN F., WIEPRECHT E., WIEST M., WIEZORREK E., WOILLEZ J., YAZICI S., ZIEGLER D. and ZINS G.

Abstract (from CDS):

The highly elliptical, 16-year-period orbit of the star S2 around the massive black hole candidate Sgr A* is a sensitive probe of the gravitational field in the Galactic centre. Near pericentre at 120AU~=1400 Schwarzschild radii, the star has an orbital speed of ~=7650km/s, such that the first-order effects of Special and General Relativity have now become detectable with current capabilities. Over the past 26 years, we have monitored the radial velocity and motion on the sky of S2, mainly with the SINFONI and NACO adaptive optics instruments on the ESO Very Large Telescope, and since 2016 and leading up to the pericentre approach in May 2018, with the four-telescope interferometric beam-combiner instrument GRAVITY. From data up to and including pericentre, we robustly detect the combined gravitational redshift and relativistic transverse Doppler effect for S2 of z=Δλ/λ~=200km/s/c with different statistical analysis methods. When parameterising the post-Newtonian contribution from these effects by a factor f , with f=0 and f=1 corresponding to the Newtonian and general relativistic limits, respectively, we find from posterior fitting with different weighting schemes f=0.90±0.09stat±0.15sys. The S2 data are inconsistent with pure Newtonian dynamics.

Abstract Copyright: © ESO 2018

Journal keyword(s): Galaxy: center - gravitation - black hole physics

Simbad objects: 8

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Number of rows : 8
N Identifier Otype ICRS (J2000)
RA 		ICRS (J2000)
DEC 		Mag U Mag B Mag V Mag R Mag I Sp type #ref
1850 - 2026 		#notes
1 * alf CMa B WD* 06 45 09.3041925037 -16 43 00.724740067   8.41 8.44     DA1.9 563 1
2 NAME Galactic Center reg 17 45 39.60213 -29 00 22.0000           ~ 16269 0
3 GCIRS 7 LP* 17 45 39.987 -29 00 22.24           M2 388 0
4 NAME Sgr A* X 17 45 40.03599 -29 00 28.1699           ~ 4970 3
5 [EG97] S2 * 17 45 40.0442 -29 00 27.975           B0/2V 420 1
6 GCIRS 16NW WR* 17 45 40.0451 -29 00 26.847           Ofpe/WN9 144 0
7 GCIRS 16C WR* 17 45 40.12 -29 00 27.6           Ofpe/WN9 197 1
8 GCIRS 16NE WR* 17 45 40.26 -29 00 27.2           Ofpe/WN9 156 0

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