The chemical composition of the sun
Abstract
The present status of knowledge of the sun's chemical composition is reviewed. Attention is given to the different methods used to investigate the helium abundance, including the detection of solar neutrinos, the analysis of the chromospheric spectrum, and the composition of cosmic rays and the solar wind. Photospheric, chromospheric and coronal abundances of the heavier elements are studied separately and then compared in order to check the chemical homogeneity of the solar atmosphere. In addition, element abundances in the sun are compared with those found in meteorites, (more precisely, the carbonaceous chondrites), to obtain information on the chemical composition of the primordial nebula from which the solar system originated. It is noted that photospheric abundances of most common elements are known with reasonable precision, but that chromospheric and coronal abundances are usually determined with much greater uncertainty; there is no evidence for inhomogeneities in the distribution of most elements through the different layers of the solar atmosphere, and photospheric and meteoritic abundances of most elements are found to match excellently.
- Publication:
-
Memorie della Societa Astronomica Italiana
- Pub Date:
- March 1980
- Bibcode:
- 1980MmSAI..51...15M
- Keywords:
-
- Abundance;
- Chemical Composition;
- Solar Atmosphere;
- Solar Physics;
- Helium;
- Photosphere;
- Solar Corona;
- Solar Cosmic Rays;
- Solar Neutrinos;
- Solar Wind;
- Solar Physics