EPoS Contribution

Overview and initial results of the ALMA Central Molecular Zone Exploration Survey (ACES) Ashley Barnes ESO, Munich, DE
The Central Molecular Zone (CMZ) within the Milky Way serves as a unique astrophysical laboratory due to its extreme environment and proximity to Earth. With characteristics such as high densities, temperatures, pressures, turbulent motions, and strong magnetic fields, it stands as the most extreme star-forming environment in our Galaxy, closely resembling starburst systems and high-redshift galaxies. Consequently, the CMZ provides an ideal setting for testing the extremes of current star and planet formation theory. To delve into this unique environment, the ALMA large project ACES (ALMA Central Molecular Zone Exploration Survey) capitalizes on ALMA's sensitivity, resolution, and image fidelity to map gas properties from cloud scales down to the size of individual forming stars across the whole inner 100 parsecs of the Galaxy. With ACES, we aim to address a number of fundamental open questions in star formation, stellar feedback and galaxy evolution, provide a new benchmark for understanding how the mass flows and energy cycles shape the centres of galaxies, regulate star formation and control the activity of the central supermassive black holes. In this talk, I will provide an overview of the project, discuss the current state of the observations, and present some initial results from the survey.

Caption: Background three colour image Overlay: HNCO (4-3) maximum intensity (12m+7m+TP; ACES) Green: 8 μm Spitzer GLIMPSE survey (Churchwell et al. 2009) Yellow: 24 μm Spitzer MIPSGAL survey (Carey et al. 2009) Red: 20 cm emission observed by MeerKAT (Heywood et al. 2019, 2022)
Collaborators: ACES	Relevant topic(s): Cores High-Mass SF Molecular Clouds
Relevant Big Question: How do extreme environments such as galactic centers influence star formation, feedback and galactic evolution?