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The Intrinsic Properties of the Local Interstellar Medium

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 April 2016

Olivia Puyoo
Affiliation:
Institut d’Astrophysique de Paris, 98 bis Blvd Arago, 75014 Paris, France
Lotfi Ben Jaffel
Affiliation:
Institut d’Astrophysique de Paris, 98 bis Blvd Arago, 75014 Paris, France

Abstract

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We propose a new method to constrain the actual state of the interstellar cloud that surrounds the solar system. Using Voyager UVS Lyman-α sky maps and the powerful principle of invariance, we derive the H distribution all along the spacecraft path. Provided current models of the heliopause interface between the solar and the interstellar winds, we extrapolate this distribution to farther distances from the Sun and infer in a self consistent way key parameters of the local cloud. Our findings are a high interstellar hydrogen density of ~ 0.24 cm−3 and a weak ionization .

Type
Part II UV and Soft X-ray Observations of the LISM
Copyright
Copyright © Springer-Verlag 1998

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