Cool Stars 14 - Submitted Abstract # 309
This version created on 05 October 2006

Abundances from Other Means:  A Cosmic Chemical Composition Caprice


Jeremy Drake, Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory

Revisions of the solar chemical composition suggested in recent years
appear to be inconsistent with inference from helioseismology.  The
resulting controversy has stimulated renewed interest in chemical
abundance diagnostics based on solar wind and particle measurements,
the solar corona, and on the ISM, stars and other objects in the local
galactic environment.  Solar EUV, X-ray and particle observations
appear in good agreement with the newly recommended solar mixture.  Or
are they?  Recent studies of the local cosmos, and clues from the Sun
itself, provide hints that the fifth most abundant element, neon,
could be playing an important part in a cosmic chemical composition
caprice.  

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