Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astronomy
Scientific paper
Nov 1987
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1987pasp...99.1134k&link_type=abstract
(Astronomical Society of the Pacific, Symposium on Cool Stars and the Structure of Galaxies, Pomona College, Claremont, CA, July
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astronomy
15
Galactic Evolution, Galactic Structure, H I Regions, Interstellar Gas, Molecular Clouds, Carbon Monoxide, Emission Spectra, Hydrogen Atoms, Mass Distribution, Star Formation, Stellar Winds
Scientific paper
This paper considers the physical structure and the distribution of gas in the Galaxy, with particular attention given to the galactic distribution of the interstellar atomic and molecular hydrogen. These two components, which contain essentially all of the interstellar gas by mass, are distributed in a thin disk in which both the total gas surface density and the ratio of molecular to atomic hydrogen decrease more or less monotonically with distance from the center of the Galaxy. The molecular hydrogen is concentrated in large (up to a million solar masses) clouds in which star formation is taking place. Due to mass loss from evolving stars, about 20 percent of gas is returned to the interstellar medium. The scale height of the interstellar molecular hydrogen is about half that of the atomic gas.
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