Galactic Archaeology with the Gaia data

银河系是我们可以非常详细地观察到的一个盘状星系，我们可以研究年龄和金属丰度跨度很大的单个恒星。我们观察到的较老的恒星是恒星化石，包含了银河系形成时期的信息。对它们的化学和运动特性的研究被称为“银河考古学”。欧洲航天局的盖亚任务（于2013年12月启动）将在未来十年里，在正在进行的地面项目的基础上，彻底改变银河考古学。Mullard空间科学实验室（MSSL）在Gaia的任务开发和光谱方面的数据处理联盟中都起着重要作用。该项目将利用盖亚数据与各种地面光谱调查数据相结合，揭示银河系的质量分布（包括恒星和暗物质）以及这些观测数据中银河系的形成历史

The Milky Way is the one disk galaxy that we can observe in great detail and study individual stars that span a wide range of ages and metallicities. The older stars that we observe are stellar fossils, containing information from the epoch of Galaxy formation. Studies of their chemical and kinematic properties are known as ''Galactic Archaeology''. The ESA's Gaia mission (launched in Dec. 2013) is set to revolutionise Galactic Archaeology over the coming decade, building upon ongoing ground-based projects. Mullard Space Science Laboratory (MSSL) has major roles both in the mission development of Gaia and in the data processing consortium for the spectroscopy aspect. The project will exploit the Gaia data combined with the various ground-based spectroscopic survey data, and unveil the mass distribution (both stellar and dark matter) of the Milky Way and the formation history of the Milky Way from these observational data