Oort problem

Rix, Bovy, and I discussed re-doing the famous Oort problem on the vertical structure of the Milky Way disk; that is, infer the density of the disk by simultaneously fitting for the position and velocity distribution of stars in the vertical direction. The differences now relative to the 1930s is that we have far more stars, far better measurements, and we can do the test over a finite fraction of the Milky Way disk. We might be able to see gradients and look for signatures of departure from axisymmetry, which would be qualitatively new.