Journal
ASTROPHYSICAL JOURNAL
Volume 630, Issue 1, Pages L41-L44Publisher
IOP PUBLISHING LTD
DOI: 10.1086/466524
Keywords
cosmology : observations; Galaxy : general; ISM : abundances; radio lines : ISM; techniques : spectroscopic
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The deuterium abundance in the primordial gas formed during the big bang is dependent on the baryon-to-photon ratio during nucleosynthesis. We report a measurement of the deuterium-to-hydrogen (D/H) ratio from a 6 sigma detection of the hyperfine ground-state transition of deuterium at 327 MHz (92 cm) in emission from the interstellar gas in the region of the Galactic anticenter. We find the maximum signal at l = 183 degrees, where the deuterium line opacity is expected to be a maximum as a result of velocity crowding. Using these deuterium and existing hydrogen observations, we model the effects of beam dilution, spin temperature, and absorption of continuum to derive a D/H ratio of 2.3(-1.3)(+1.5) 10(-5) by number. The errors are +/- 3 sigma plus our estimate of the systematic uncertainty in the conversion of the observed line amplitude to the D/ H ratio.
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