Three-component Stackel potentials satisfying recent estimates of Milky Way parameters

Abstract

We present a set of three-component Stackel potentials defined by five parameters and designed to model the Milky Way. We review the fundamental constraints that any model of the Milky Way must satisfy, including the most recent ones derived from Hipparcos data, and we study how the parameters of the presented potentials can vary in order to match these constraints. Five different valid potentials are presented and analyzed in detail: they are designed to be confronted with kinematical surveys in the future, by the construction of three-integral analytic distribution functions.