Gaia Early Data Release 3: The Galactic anticentre

Antoja, T., et al. (Gaia Collaboration)[Aims] We aim to demonstrate the scientific potential of the Gaia Early Data Release 3 (EDR3) for the study of different aspects of the Milky Way structure and evolution and we provide, at the same time, a description of several practical aspects of the data and examples of their usage. [Methods] We used astrometric positions, proper motions, parallaxes, and photometry from EDR3 to select different populations and components and to calculate the distances and velocities in the direction of the anticentre. In this direction, the Gaia astrometric data alone enable the calculation of the vertical and azimuthal velocities; also, the extinction is relatively low compared to other directions in the Galactic plane. We then explore the disturbances of the current disc, the spatial and kinematical distributions of early accreted versus in situ stars, the structures in the outer parts of the disc, and the orbits of open clusters Berkeley 29 and Saurer 1. [Results] With the improved astrometry and photometry of EDR3, we find that: (i) the dynamics of the Galactic disc are very complex with oscillations in the median rotation and vertical velocities as a function of radius, vertical asymmetries, and new correlations, including a bimodality with disc stars with large angular momentum moving vertically upwards from below the plane, and disc stars with slightly lower angular momentum moving preferentially downwards; (ii) we resolve the kinematic substructure (diagonal ridges) in the outer parts of the disc for the first time; (iii) the red sequence that has been associated with the proto-Galactic disc that was present at the time of the merger with Gaia-Enceladus-Sausage is currently radially concentrated up to around 14 kpc, while the blue sequence that has been associated with debris of the satellite extends beyond that; (iv) there are density structures in the outer disc, both above and below the plane, most probably related to Monoceros, the Anticentre Stream, and TriAnd, for which the Gaia data allow an exhaustive selection of candidate member stars and dynamical study; and (v) the open clusters Berkeley 29 and Saurer 1, despite being located at large distances from the Galactic centre, are on nearly circular disc-like orbits. [Conclusions] Even with our simple preliminary exploration of the Gaia EDR3, we demonstrate how, once again, these data from the European Space Agency are crucial for our understanding of the different pieces of our Galaxy and their connection to its global structure and history.The Gaia mission and data processing have financially been supported by, in alphabetical order by country: the Algerian Centre de Recherche en Astronomie,Astrophysique et Géophysique of Bouzareah Observatory; the Austrian Fonds zur Förderung der wissenschaftlichen Forschung (FWF) Hertha Firnberg Programme through grants T359, P20046, and P23737; the BELgian federal Science Policy Office (BELSPO) through various PROgramme de Développement d’Expériences scientifiques (PRODEX) grants and the Polish Academy of Sciences - Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek through grant VS.091.16N, and the Fonds de la Recherche Scientifique (FNRS); the Brazil-France exchange programmes Fundaçãode Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP) and Coordenação de Aperfeicoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) - Comité Français d’Evaluation de la Coopération Universitaire et Scientifique avec le Brésil (COFECUB); the National Science Foundation of China (NSFC) through grants 11573054 and 11703065 and the China Scholarship Council through grant 201806040200; the Tenure Track Pilot Programme of the Croatian Science Foundation and the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne and the project TTP-2018-07-1171 ‘Mining the Variable Sky’, with the funds of the Croatian-Swiss Research Programme; the Czech-Republic Ministry of Education, Youth, and Sports through grant LG 15010 and INTER-EXCELLENCE grant LTAUSA18093, and the Czech Space Office through ESA PECS contract 98058; the Danish Ministry of Science; the Estonian Ministry of Education and Research through grant IUT40-1; the European Commission’s Sixth Framework Programme through the European Leadership in Space Astrometry (ELSA) Marie Curie Research Training Network (MRTN-CT-2006-033481), through Marie Curie project PIOF-GA-2009-255267 (Space AsteroSeismology and RR Lyrae stars, SAS-RRL), and through a Marie Curie Transfer-of-Knowledge (ToK) fellowship (MTKD-CT-2004-014188); the European Commission’s Seventh Framework Programme through grant FP7-606740 (FP7-SPACE-2013-1) for the Gaia European Network for Improved data User Services (GENIUS) and through grant 264895 for the Gaia Research for European Astronomy Training (GREAT-ITN) network; the European Research Council (ERC) through grants 320360 and 647208 and through the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation and excellent science programmes through Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant 745617 as well as grants 670519 (Mixing and Angular Momentum tranSport of massIvE stars – MAMSIE), 687378 (Small Bodies: Near and Far), 682115 (Using the Magellanic Clouds to Understand the Interaction of Galaxies), and 695099 (A sub-percent distance scale from binaries and Cepheids – CepBin); the European Science Foundation (ESF), in the framework of the Gaia Research for European Astronomy Training Research Network Programme (GREAT-ESF); the European Space Agency (ESA) in the framework of the Gaia project, through the Plan for European Cooperating States (PECS) programme through grants for Slovenia, through contracts C98090 and 4000106398/12/NL/KML for Hungary, and through contract 4000115263/15/NL/IB for Germany; the Academy of Finland and the Magnus Ehrnrooth Foundation; the French Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales (CNES), the Agence Nationale de la Recherche (ANR) through grant ANR-10-IDEX-0001-02 for the ‘Investissements d’avenir’ programme, through grant ANR-15-CE31-0007 for project ‘Modelling the Milky Way in the Gaia era’ (MOD4Gaia), through grant ANR-14-CE33-0014-01 for project ‘The Milky Way disc formation in the Gaia era’ (ARCHEOGAL), and through grant ANR-15-CE31-0012-01 for project ‘Unlocking the potential of Cepheids as primary distance calibrators’ (UnlockCepheids), the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) and its SNO Gaia of the Institut des Sciences de l’Univers (INSU), the ‘Action Fédératrice Gaia’ of the Observatoire de Paris, the Région de Franche-Comté, and the Programme National de Gravitation, Références, Astronomie, et Métrologie (GRAM) of CNRS/INSU with the Institut National Polytechnique (INP) and the Institut National de Physique nucléaire et de Physique des Particules (IN2P3) co-funded by CNES; the German Aerospace Agency (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt e.V., DLR) through grants 50QG0501, 50QG0601, 50QG0602, 50QG0701, 50QG0901, 50QG1001, 50QG1101, 50QG1401, 50QG1402, 50QG1403, 50QG1404, and 50QG1904 and the Centre for Information Services and High Performance Computing (ZIH) at the Technische Universität (TU) Dresden for generous allocations of computer time; the Hungarian Academy of Sciences through the Lendület Programme grants LP2014-17 and LP2018-7 and through the Premium Postdoctoral Research Programme (L. Molnár), and the Hungarian National Research, Development, and Innovation Office (NKFIH) through grant KH_18-130405; the Science Foundation Ireland (SFI) through a Royal Society – SFI University Research Fellowship (M. Fraser); the Israel Science Foundation (ISF) through grant 848/16; the Agenzia Spaziale Italiana (ASI) through contracts I/037/08/0, I/058/10/0, 2014-025-R.0, 2014-025-R.1.2015, and 2018-24-HH.0 to the Italian Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica (INAF), contract 2014-049-R.0/1/2 to INAF for the Space Science Data Centre (SSDC, formerly known as the ASI Science Data Center, ASDC), contracts I/008/10/0, 2013/030/I.0, 2013-030-I.0.1-2015, and 2016-17-I.0 to the Aerospace Logistics Technology Engineering Company (ALTEC S.p.A.), INAF, and the Italian Ministry of Education, University, and Research (Ministero dell’Istruzione, dell’Università e della Ricerca) through the Premiale project ‘MIning The Cosmos Big Data and Innovative Italian Technology for Frontier Astrophysics and Cosmology’ (MITiC); the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO) through grant NWO-M-614.061.414, through a VICI grant (A. Helmi), and through a Spinoza prize (A. Helmi), and the Netherlands Research School for Astronomy (NOVA); the Polish National Science Centre through HARMONIA grant 2018/30/M/ST9/00311, DAINA grant 2017/27/L/ST9/03221, and PRELUDIUM grant 2017/25/N/ST9/01253, and the Ministry of Science and Higher Education (MNiSW) through grant DIR/WK/2018/12; the Portugese Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT) through grants SFRH/BPD/74697/2010 and SFRH/BD/128840/2017 and the Strategic Programme UID/FIS/00099/2019 for CENTRA; the Slovenian Research Agency through grant P1-0188; the Spanish Ministry of Economy (MINECO/FEDER, UE) through grants ESP2016-80079-C2-1-R, ESP2016-80079-C2-2-R, RTI2018-095076-B-C21, RTI2018-095076-B-C22, BES-2016-078499, and BES-2017-083126 and the Juan de la Cierva formación 2015 grant FJCI-2015-2671, the Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture, and Sports through grant FPU16/03827, the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (MICINN) through grant AYA2017-89841P for project ‘Estudio de las propiedades de los fósiles estelares en el entorno del Grupo Local’ and through grant TIN2015-65316-P for project ‘Computación de Altas Prestaciones VII’, the Severo Ochoa Centre of Excellence Programme of the Spanish Government through grant SEV2015-0493, the Institute of Cosmos Sciences University of Barcelona (ICCUB, Unidad de Excelencia ‘María de Maeztu’) through grants MDM-2014-0369 and CEX2019-000918-M, the University of Barcelona’s official doctoral programme for the development of an R+D+i project through an Ajuts de Personal Investigador en Formació (APIF) grant, the Spanish Virtual Observatory through project AyA2017-84089, the Galician Regional Government, Xunta de Galicia, through grants ED431B-2018/42 and ED481A-2019/155, support received from the Centro de Investigación en Tecnologías de la Información y las Comunicaciones (CITIC) funded by the Xunta de Galicia, the Xunta de Galicia and the Centros Singulares de Investigación de Galicia for the period 2016-2019 through CITIC, the European Union through the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) / Fondo Europeo de Desenvolvemento Rexional (FEDER) for the Galicia 2014-2020 Programme through grant ED431G-2019/01, the Red Española de Supercomputación (RES) computer resources at MareNostrum, the Barcelona Supercomputing Centre - Centro Nacional de Supercomputación (BSC-CNS) through activities AECT-2016-1-0006, AECT-2016-2-0013, AECT-2016-3-0011, and AECT-2017-1-0020, the Departament d’Innovació, Universitats i Empresa de la Generalitat de Catalunya through grant 2014-SGR-1051 for project ‘Models de Programació i Entorns d’Execució Parallels’ (MPEXPAR), and Ramon y Cajal Fellowship RYC2018-025968-I; the Swedish National Space Agency (SNSA/Rymdstyrelsen); the Swiss State Secretariat for Education, Research, and Innovation through the ESA PRODEX programme, the Mesures d’Accompagnement, the Swiss Activités Nationales Complémentaires, and the Swiss National Science Foundation; the United Kingdom Particle Physics and Astronomy Research Council (PPARC), the United Kingdom Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC), and the United Kingdom Space Agency (UKSA) through the following grants to the University of Bristol, the University of Cambridge, the University of Edinburgh, the University of Leicester, the Mullard Space Sciences Laboratory of University College London, and the United Kingdom Rutherford Appleton Laboratory (RAL): PP/D006511/1, PP/D006546/1, PP/D006570/1, ST/I000852/1, ST/J005045/1, ST/K00056X/1, ST/K000209/1, ST/K000756/1, ST/L006561/1, ST/N000595/1, ST/N000641/1, ST/N000978/1, ST/N001117/1, ST/S000089/1, ST/S000976/1, ST/S001123/1, ST/S001948/1, ST/S002103/1, and ST/V000969/1