8084858
HIGHLY IONIZED HIGH-VELOCITY CLOUDS: HOT INTERGALACTIC MEDIUM OR GALACTIC HALO?
We use spectroscopic data from the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) and Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer (FUSE) to study the wide range of ionization states of the "highly ionized high-velocity clouds" (HVCs). Studied extensively in O VI absorption, these clouds are usually assumed to be infalling gas in the Galactic halo at distances less than 50 kpc. An alternative model attributes the O VI (and O VII X-ray absorption) to cosmological structures of low-density, shock-heated intergalactic gas, distributed over 1-3 Mpc surrounding the Milky Way. The latter interpretation is unlikely, owing to the enormous required mass of gas (4 × 1012 M☉). Our detection, in 9 of 12 sight lines, of low-ionization stages (C II/III/IV; Si II/III/IV) at similar high velocities as O VI requires gas densities far above that (nH ≈ 5 × 10-6 cm-3) associated with the warm-hot intergalactic medium (WHIM). These HVCs are probably cooling, multiphase gas in the Galactic halo, bow shocks, and interfaces between clouds falling through a hot, rotating gaseous halo. The velocity segregation of these HVCs in Galactic coordinates is consistent with a pattern in which infalling clouds reflect the sense of Galactic rotation, with peculiar velocities superposed.
1954406
Hubble Space Telescope Survey of Interstellar High-Velocity Si III
We describe an ultraviolet spectroscopic survey of interstellar high-velocity cloud (HVC) absorption in the strong ?1206.500 line of Si III using the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph aboard the Hubble Space Telescope. Because the Si III line is 4-5 times stronger than O VI ?1031.926, it provides a sensitive probe of ionized gas down to column densities N Si III 5 ? 1011 cm?2 at Si III equivalent width 10 m?. We detect high-velocity Si III over 91% ? 4% of the sky (53 of 58 sight lines); 59% of the HVCs show negative local standard of rest velocities. The mean HVC column density per sight line is log N Si III = 13.19 ? 0.45, while the mean for all 90 velocity components is 12.92 ? 0.46. Lower limits due to Si III line saturation are included in this average, so the actual mean/median values are even higher. The Si III appears to trace an extensive ionized component of Galactic halo gas at temperatures 104.0-4.5 K indicative of a cooling flow. Photoionization models suggest that typical Si III absorbers with 12.5 < log N Si III < 13.5 have total hydrogen column densities N H 1018-1019 cm?2 for gas of hydrogen density n H 0.1 cm?3 and 10% solar metallicity. With typical neutral fractions N H I /N H 0.01, these HVCs may elude even long-duration 21 cm observations at Arecibo, the EVLA, and other radio facilities. However, if Si III is associated with higher density gas, n H ? 1 cm?3, the corresponding neutral hydrogen could be visible in deep observations. This reservoir of ionized gas may contain 108 M ? and produce a mass infall rate of 1 M ? yr?1 to the Galactic disk.
13041515
Proof of factorization for deeply virtual Compton scattering in QCD
We show that factorization holds for the deeply virtual Compton scattering amplitude in QCD, up to power suppressed terms, to all orders in perturbation theory. The theorem applies to the production of off-shell photons as well as real photons. We give a detailed treatment of the situation where one of the two partons joining the parton density to the hard scattering has zero longitudinal momentum. {copyright} {ital 1999} {ital The American Physical Society}
121385558
Superdense Matter: Neutrons Or Asymptotically Free Quarks?