Weighing the young stellar discs around Sgr A*

Abstract

It is believed that young massive stars orbiting Sgr A* in two stellar discs on scales of 0.1-0.2 parsecs were formed either farther out in the Galaxy and then quickly migrated inward, or in situ in a massive self-gravitating disc. Comparing N-body evolution of stellar orbits with observational constraints, we set upper limits on the masses of the two stellar systems. These masses turn out to be few times lower than the expected total stellar mass estimated from the observed young high-mass stellar population and the standard galactic IMF. If these stars were formed in situ, in a massive self-gravitating disc, our results suggest that the formation of low-mass stars was suppressed by a factor of at least a few, requiring a top-heavy initial mass function (IMF) for stars formed near sgr A*.