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B. Otte, W. V. Dixon, R. Sankrit (The Johns Hopkins University)
Emission from the O\,VI doublet (at 1032 and 1038 Å) is an important piece in the puzzle of understanding the interstellar medium. While emission lines in the optical probe the warm ionized gas at 104 K, the far-ultraviolet O\,VI lines trace gas with temperatures near 3 \times 105 K. Whether the majority of the observed O\,VI emission originates in gas that is cooling from hot (106 K), X-ray emitting gas or in interface regions between hot and cold gas is still the subject of considerable debate. We present the first results of an O\,VI emission survey using archival data from FUSE, the Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer. Including over 100 sight lines, this survey nearly doubles the number of known sight lines with measurable O\,VI emission (from 10 to 18). When combined with all-sky X-ray and H\alpha maps, these data provide important clues to the distribution and kinematics of hot gas in the Galaxy.
This work is supported by NASA contract NAS5-32985 to the Johns Hopkins University.
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Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 35#5
© 2003. The American Astronomical Soceity.