Gaia Data Release 3: Chemical cartography of the Milky Way

TL;DR

Gaia DR3 provides an extensive all-sky spectral dataset enabling detailed chemo-dynamical mapping of the Milky Way, revealing its structure, chemical patterns, and evolutionary history with unprecedented coverage and precision.

Contribution

This paper presents the first comprehensive chemo-dynamical analysis of the Milky Way using Gaia DR3 data, unveiling new insights into its structure and evolution.

Findings

Reveals the Galaxy's vertical symmetry and flared disc structure.

Links kinematic disturbances to chemical patterns in stars.

Shows a steepening of metallicity gradients with age.

Abstract

Gaia DR3 opens a new era of all-sky spectral analysis of stellar populations thanks to the nearly 5.6 million stars observed by the RVS and parametrised by the GSP-spec module. The all-sky Gaia chemical cartography allows a powerful and precise chemo-dynamical view of the Milky Way with unprecedented spatial coverage and statistical robustness. First, it reveals the strong vertical symmetry of the Galaxy and the flared structure of the disc. Second, the observed kinematic disturbances of the disc -- seen as phase space correlations -- and kinematic or orbital substructures are associated with chemical patterns that favour stars with enhanced metallicities and lower [alpha/Fe] abundance ratios compared to the median values in the radial distributions. This is detected both for young objects that trace the spiral arms and older populations. Several alpha, iron-peak elements and at least one heavy element trace the thin and thick disc properties in the solar cylinder. Third, young disc stars show a recent chemical impoverishment in several elements. Fourth, the largest chemo-dynamical sample of open clusters analysed so far shows a steepening of the radial metallicity gradient with age, which is also observed in the young field population. Finally, the Gaia chemical data have the required coverage and precision to unveil galaxy accretion debris and heated disc stars on halo orbits through their [alpha/Fe] ratio, and to allow the study of the chemo-dynamical properties of globular clusters. Gaia DR3 chemo-dynamical diagnostics open new horizons before the era of ground-based wide-field spectroscopic surveys. They unveil a complex Milky Way that is the outcome of an eventful evolution, shaping it to the present day (abridged).