Bjarne Rosenkilde Jørgensen

Local Galactic Evolution

The evolution of the Solar neighbourhood is followed using a unique, magnitude complete and kinematically unbiased sample of 14,000 F, G, and K dwarfs. Metallicity, age, space motion and galactic orbits have been determined for all stars. The result is a detailed view of the complex evolution of the local Milky Way, which must be matched by any model for the chemical and dynamical evolution of the Galactic disk. E.g., such models must explain the shape and large scatter in the age-metallity relation as well as the overall metallicity distribution; the evolution of stellar kinematics with age; the distribution of stars in velocity space; and the contributions from the thick and thin disks to all these relations.