Other
Scientific paper
Jul 1995
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1995hst..prop.6070m&link_type=abstract
HST Proposal ID #6070
Other
Hst Proposal Id #6070 Interstellar Medium
Scientific paper
We propose a study to obtain high quality interstellarabundance data for the heavy element Sn (Z = 50), an elementproduced mainly by s-process neutron capture in intermediate-to-low mass AGB stars, in a number of ISM sight lines knownto sample a range of gas densities and depletions onto dust.Current (limited) data on Sn/H in a few dense ISM sight linescharacteristic of large gas depletions onto dust show theabundance to be consistent with the solar value (i.e. nodepletion onto dust). However, since Sn should be chemicallysimilar to the other periodic table group IVA elements (i.e.C, Si, Ge, Sn, Pb) which share a common outer electron shellstructure and which are depleted from solar by at least afactor 3, it should be somewhat depleted onto dust.Consequently, we believe that the apparent solar abundancereflects the fact that the ISM ( cosmic) abundance of Sn hasincreased since the formation of the solar system 4.5 billionyears ago. This supposition is not unreasonable: observationsof other heavy s-process elements in the atmospheres of someintermediate-to-low mass AGB stars show substantialenrichments and so we expect that some heavy s-process elementenrichment of the ISM must have occurred. What makes thescience proposed here significant is that it provides a greatopportunity to determine the degree of enrichment, yieldingimportant information on bulk s-process yields and cumulativeinjection of this material into the ISM over the past
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