Unravelling the chemical inhomogeneity of PNe with VLT FLAMES integral-field unit spectroscopy
Abstract
Recent weak emission-line long-slit surveys and modelling studies of PNe have convincingly argued in favour of the existence of an unknown component in the planetary nebula plasma consisting of cold, hydrogen-deficient gas, as an explanation for the long-standing recombination-line versus forbidden-line temperature and abundance discrepancy problems. Here we describe the rationale and initial results from a detailed spectroscopic study of three Galactic PNe undertaken with the VLT FLAMES integral-field unit spectrograph, which advances our knowledge about the small-scale physical properties, chemical abundances and velocity structure of these objects across a two-dimensional field of view, and opens up for exploration an uncharted territory in the study and modelling of PNe and photoionized nebulae in general.
- Publication:
-
Planetary Nebulae in our Galaxy and Beyond
- Pub Date:
- 2006
- DOI:
- 10.1017/S1743921306003036
- arXiv:
- arXiv:astro-ph/0605188
- Bibcode:
- 2006IAUS..234..239T
- Keywords:
-
- Astrophysics
- E-Print:
- 4 pages