A Milliarcsecond-accurate Position for Sagittarius A*

Abstract

The absolute position of Sgr A*, the compact radio source at the center of the Milky Way, had been uncertain by several tens of milliarcseconds. Here we report improved astrometric measurements of the absolute position and proper motion of Sgr A*. Three epochs of phase-referencing observations were conducted with the Very Long Baseline Array for Sgr A* at 22 and 43 GHz in 2019 and 2020. Using extragalactic radio sources with submilliarcsecond-accurate positions as reference, we determined the absolute position of Sgr A* at a reference epoch 2020.0 to be at α(J2000) = 17h45m40.ˢ032863 ± 0.ˢ000016 and δ(J2000) = −0.″00047, with an updated proper motion −3.152 ± 0.011 and −5.586 ± 0.006 mas yr−1 in the easterly and northerly directions, respectively.