Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astrophysics
Scientific paper
1996-10-15
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astrophysics
To appear in the Proceedings of the IAGUSP Workshop on Young Galaxies and QSO Absorbers (Santos, Brazil; April 8-11, 1996), ed
Scientific paper
Recent confrontations of the predictions of standard big bang nucleosynthesis (SBBN) with the primordial abundances of the light nuclides inferred from observational data reveal a conflict. Simply put, compared to theoretical expectations the inferred primordial abundances of either deuterium or helium-4 (or both) are ``too small". Here I outline the ``tension" between D and $^4$He in the context of SBBN. The incipient crisis for SBBN may be resolved by observations of deuterium in nearly pristine environments such as the high-redshift, low-metallicity QSO absorbers. At present the big bang abundances of deuterium inferred from such data fall into two, apparently mutually exclusive, groups. I describe the deuterium dichotomy and its implications for SBBN as well as for cosmology in general.
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