Meng Zhang

The Milky Way’s Early Disk Was Built in Bursts. I. Evidence from Low-angular-momentum, High-α Stars Scattered Out of the Protodisk by Merger Events

Stars born in the high-α disk can later acquire low angular momentum through dynamical scattering during early merger events. Their age–metallicity distribution thus provides a fossil record of the history of both star formation and dynamical perturbations in the early Milky Way disk. Here we identify a sample of 2078...