A new photometric model of the galactic bar using red clump giants

We present a study of the luminosity density distribution of the Galactic bar using number counts of red clump giants from the Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment (OGLE) III survey. The data were recently published by Nataf et al. for 9019 fields towards the bulge and have 2.94 × 10₆ RC stars over a viewing area of 90.25 deg₂. The data include the number counts, mean distance modulus (μ), dispersion in μ and full errormatrix, from which we fit the data with several triaxial parametric models. We use the Markov Chain Monte Carlo method to explore the parameter space and find that the best-fitting model is the E3 model, with the distance to the GC 8.13 kpc, the ratio of semimajor and semiminor bar axis scalelengths in the Galactic plane x₀, y₀ and vertical bar scalelength z0 x₀: y₀: z₀ ≈ 1.00: 0.43: 0.40 (close to being prolate). The scalelength of the stellar density profile along the bar's major axis is ~0.67 kpc and has an angle of 29. ? 4, slightly larger than the value obtained from a similar study based on OGLE-II data. The number of estimated RC stars within the field of view is 2.78 × 106, which is systematically lower than the observed value. We subtract the smooth parametric model from the observed counts and find that the residuals are consistent with the presence of an X-shaped structure in the Galactic Centre, the excess to the estimated mass content is ~5.8 per cent. We estimate that the total mass of the bar is ~1.8 × 1010M. Our results can be used as a key ingredient to construct new density models of the Milky Way and will have implications on the predictions of the optical depth to gravitational microlensing and the patterns of hydrodynamical gas flow in the Milky Way.