Physics & Astronomy Cara Battersby - Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics

"The Milky Way Laboratory"

Myriad physical processes shape galaxies throughout the distant cosmos, far outside the reach of detailed study with our telescopes.  Luckily for us, we can study these processes up close and personal in the laboratory that is our own Milky Way Galaxy.  On a tour through our Milky Way Laboratory, I will discuss 1) how we can use long, skinny molecular clouds, potential "Bones of the Milky Way," to trace our Galaxy's spiral structure, 2) how large surveys of our Galaxy have revealed that star clusters continue to grow even as they are forming, and 3) how observing the Central Molecular Zone (the inner few hundred parsecs of our Galaxy) can help us learn more about gas is converted into stars during the peak of cosmic star formation (z~2).