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B. A. Keeney (CASA, Univ. of Colorado)
Galactic winds are a leading mechanism for transporting metals and energy from galaxies to enrich the intergalactic medium (IGM). My thesis uses sight lines to bright background QSOs with impact parameters of less than 150 kpc from the host galaxy to investigate whether the gas entrained in starburst winds is able to escape from the gravitational potential well of the host galaxy. I find two nearby dwarf galaxies with unbound winds and two massive galaxies, one of which is the Milky Way, whose winds cannot escape from their gravitational potentials. I conclude that starburst winds escape more easily from dwarf galaxies than their more massive counterparts due to their shallow potential wells. Thus, dwarf galaxies could be primarily responsible for enriching the IGM with metals. This thesis uses observations made with the Hubble Space Telescope, the Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer, the Very Large Array, Arecibo Observatory, and the ARC 3.5-m Telescope at Apache Point Observatory.
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Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 37 #4
© 2005. The American Astronomical Soceity.