Optical Emission from Shock Waves. II. Diagnostic Diagrams

From a matrix of models of plane-parallel radiating shocks with varying elemental abundances and shock conditions, a set of diagnostic diagrams analogous to those used for many years for H ii regions has been computed. This should enable abundances and shock conditions to be calculated for any reasonably evolved optical supernova remnant provided adequate spectrophotometric data are available. Subject headings: nebulae: supernova remnants - shock waves