The Galaxy

Spectral analysis shows quite clearly that the various types of atoms are exactly the same on Earth as in the sky, in my own hand or in the hand of Orion. Stars are material objects, in the baryonic sense of the term. All astrophysical objects, apart from a noteworthy fraction of the dark-matter haloes, all stars and gaseous clouds are undoubtedly composed of atoms. However, the relative proportions of these atoms vary from one place to another. The term abundance is traditionally used to describe the quantity of a particular element relative to the quantity of hydrogen. Apart from this purely astronomical definition, the global criterion of metallicity has been defined with a view to chemical differentiation of various media. Astronomers abuse the term metaT by applying it to all elements heavier than helium. They reserve the letter Z for the mass fraction of elements above helium in a given sample, i.e. the percentage of metals by mass contained in 1 g of the matter under consideration. (Note that the same symbol is used for the atomic number, i.e. the number of protons in the nucleus. The context should distinguish which is intended.) 

The chemical evolution of the Cosmos is by now an undeniable reality, clearly demonstrated on a more modest scale by careful studies of our own Galaxy. Indeed, considering the Milky Way and its retinue of nearby galaxies, different populations arise that can be classified as metal-rich, metal-poor or average. 

Having calculated the age of each group of stars, we may read off the indicators for the chemical evolution of galactic gases as a whole.  

They carry the stamp of the Big Bang, whence their great interest for cosmology. Their lithium content in particular is a precious clue as to the nucleonic density of the Universe, combined with deuterium and helium abundances measured in extremely metal-poor media (see Appendix 1). 

The first major observation is thus that the Sun is a rich star compared with the ancient stars in the galactic halo, placed like a crown around the Milky Way, but that its composition is close to that of the stars in the disk where it itself resides. Our daytime star therefore belongs to the wealthy fellowship of the disk. Whereas the halo is almost completely devoid of gases, the disk abounds in them. 

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Figure 8.30. Cumulative number distribution for the galaxies in the Universe. Mass is assumed proportional to absolute luminosity (units solar luminosity x 10 ). From Brown et al. (1983).

In fact, the sun is not a first-generation main-sequence star since spectroscopic evidence shows the presence of many heavier elements thought to be formed in other types of stars and subsequently distributed throughout the galaxy for eventual accretion into later generations of main-sequence stars. In the presence of heavier elements, particularly carbon and nitrogen, a catalytic sequence of nuclear reactions aids the fusion of protons to helium (H. A. Bethe... 

If the galaxies are moving away from each other, then in the past they were closer to one another than they are now. Furthermore, it can be calculated from... 

How might the interaction between two discrete particles be described by a finite-information based physics Unlike classical mechanics, in which a collision redistributes the particles momentum, or quantum mechanics, which effectively distributes their probability amplitudes, finite physics presumably distributes the two particles information content. How can we make sense of the process A scatters J5, if B s momentum information is dispersed halfway across the galaxy [minsky82]. Minsky s answer is that the universe must do some careful bookkeeping, ... 

The entire universe is made up of matter, from the vast reaches of the galaxies to a simple glass of water. As we describe in the coming chapters, matter is composed of tiny particles called atoms. On Earth there are around 100 different kinds of atoms, each kind with its own unique combination of properties. The complexity of our world arises from the unlimited number of ways that atoms can combine to form different molecules. The principles of modem chemistry are organized around the molecular nature of matter. Our book presents this perspective while at the same time emphasizing the quantitative aspects of chemistry. 

A drop of water contains an unimaginable number of molecules, as our molecular inset shows. Water is essential to life as we know it. The simple yet unusual fact that solid water (ice) floats atop liquid water allows life to exist on our planet. Just as important is the fact that water dissolves an immense range of chemical compounds Water is the solvent of life. In fact, water is so important to our perspective of life that the search for water is a key feature of our quest to discover life in other quarters of the galaxy. The inset photo of the surface of Mars, for example, shows no sign of water at present, but some erosional features appear to have been caused by flowing water in the past. 

Does the same chemistry that takes place on the Earth occur within the galaxies and nebulae in the far reaches of the universe We have no way to know for certain, but observations made by astronomers are consistent with... 

Leviton, Richard. The galaxy on Earth a traveler s guide to the planet s visionary geography. Charlottesville (VA) Hampton Roads Publ. Co., 2002. xvi, 577 p ISBN 1571742220... 

An unknown event disturbed the equilibrium of the interstellar cloud, and it collapsed. This process may have been caused by shock waves from a supernova explosion, or by a density wave of a spiral arm of the galaxy. The gas molecules and the particles were compressed, and with increasing compression, both temperature and pressure increased. It is possible that the centrifugal forces due to the rotation of the system prevented a spherical contraction. The result was a relatively flat, rotating disc of matter, in the centre of which was the primeval sun. Analogues of the early solar system, i.e., protoplanetary discs, have been identified from the radiation emitted by T Tauri stars (Koerner, 1997). 

The group identified a circular belt between 7 and 9 kpc1 from the centre of the galaxy. This zone (Fig. 11.6) consists of a population of stars which developed between 8 and 4 billion years ago it contains about 10% of all the stars in the galaxy, and around 57% of the stars in the habitable zone are older than our sun (Lineweaver et al., 2004). 

Fig. 11.6 Schematic representation of the Milky Way with the galactic life zone , in which life should be possible. The centre of the galaxy is kept practically sterile by extreme radiation, while areas in which stars are formed are localized in the spiral arms...

Chemical Abundances and Mixing in Red Clump Stars of the Galaxy... 

The studies of other elements in metal-rich planet-host stars is also giving important information about the chemical evolution of the Galaxy. 

Recent observations of the HF (1-0) R9 line at 2.3 /tm with the Phoenix spectrograph on the Gemini-South telescope has opened a new window that sheds light on understanding the chemical evolution of fluorine and the nuclear processes that produce this element. Until recently, only a small number of observations of fluorine were available and the trend of fluorine abundances with metallicity had yet to be probed in the Galaxy. 

Three sources have been proposed to produce fluorine in the Galaxy. The first was suggested by Forestini et al. (1992) and refers to production in low-mass stars during the AGB phase while two others are related to massive stars production in Wolf-Rayet stars (Meynet Arnould 2000) and in type II Supernovae, via the neutrino-induced nucleosynthesis (Woosley et al. 1990). 

Abstract. We have investigated the abundance of several chemical elements in two large stellar samples kinematically representative of the thin and the thick disks of the Galaxy. Chemical, kinematical and age data have been collected from high quality sources in the literature. Velocities (U,V,W) have been computed and used to select stars with the highest probability to belong to the thin disk and the thick disk respectively. Our results show that the two disks are chemically well separated. Both exhibit a decline of [a/Fe] with increasing [Fe/H]. A transition between the thin/thick disks stars is observed at 10 Gyr... 

This work aims at testing the suggestion of [5] that stellar rotation is faster at lower metallicity by direct measurements, especially in the LMC and SMC, on stars with —3.34 < My < —2.17, i.e. spectral types B0-B6 or masses from 6.7 to 14 M0. This work is complementary to that of [4], which deals with slightly more massive stars. The results are shown on Fig. 1 and commented in the caption. There is an excess of slow rotators in the Galaxy relative to the MCs, but the v sin i distributions of the LMC and the SMC are surprisingly similar. 

Abstract. In an effort to determine accurate stellar parameters and abundances for a large sample of nearby stars, we have performed the detailed analysis of 350 high-resolution spectra of FGK dwarfs and giants. This sample will be used to investigate behavior of chemical elements and kinematics in the thick and thin disks, in order to better constrain models of chemical and dynamical evolution of the Galaxy. 

The metallicity distribution of globular clusters in the Galaxy has a metal-rich peak at [Fe/H] -0.5 and a metal-poor peak at [Fe/H] -1.6 (e.g. Cote 1999), where most of the metal-rich ones are bulge clusters. Metallicities for samples of field stars were derived by McWilliam Rich (1994, hereafter MR94), Sadler et al. (1996), Ramirez et al. (2000). Zoccali et al. (2003) presented the... 

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