Abstract
Winds from massive stars supply ~10-3 M☉ yr-1 of gas to the central parsec of the Galactic center. I present spherically symmetric hydrodynamic simulations of the dynamics of this gas. These calculations show that a few percent of the gas, or ~few × 10-5 M☉ yr-1, flows in toward the central massive black hole Sgr A*; the remaining gas, ~10-3 M☉ yr-1, is thermally driven out of the central star cluster in a wind. This dynamical model accounts for the level of diffuse X-ray emission observed in the central 10'' of the Galactic center by Chandra and the extended X-ray source coincident with Sgr A*; the latter is a signature of gas being gravitationally captured by the black hole.
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