SF-05-0027

Monster Stars: Caught in the Act

Bethan Andrea Williams

High-mass stars drive galaxy evolution and shape the visible Universe. The Galactic Centre contains many of the most massive stars in the Galaxy, as well as the highest density young massive cluster, the Arches cluster. Despite their importance and prominence, we do not know if high-mass stars form differently in the extreme environment of the Galactic Centre, and there are no observational examples of the earliest phases of their formation. In this poster, I will present high resolution (0.13’’, ~1000 au) ALMA observations of a potential precursor of a >100 M? star at the earliest evolutionary stages. The observations show the central object is fed by a circumstellar disk and is driving an energetic outflow and bubble. Only a handful of such objects have been found in the Central Molecular Zone, none of which are at this early evolutionary stage. I will describe the physical, chemical and kinematic properties of this disk in comparison to similar objects in the disk of the Milky Way and summarise what the implications of this are for star and cluster formation in extreme environments.