Related papers: Missing Baryons in the Warm-Hot Intergalactic Medi…

STIS Echelle observations at a resolution of 10 km/s and UVES/VLT spectroscopy at a resolution of 7 km/s of the luminous QSO HE 0515-4414 (z_em = 1.73, B = 15.0) reveal four intervening O VI absorption systems in the redshift range 1.2 <…

High resolution FUSE and STIS observations of the bright QSO HE 0226-4110 (zem = 0.495) reveal the presence of a multi-phase absorption line system at zabs(O VI) = 0.20701 containing absorption from H I (Ly alpha to Ly theta), C III, O III,…

The intergalactic medium (IGM) is believed to contain the majority of baryons in the universe and to trace the same dark matter structure as galaxies, forming filaments and sheets. Lya absorbers, which sample the neutral component of the…

We present a survey of six low to moderate redshift quasars with Chandra and XMM-Newton. The primary goal is to search for the narrow X-ray absorption lines produced by highly ionized metals in the Warm-Hot Intergalactic Medium. All the…

We assess the possibility to detect and characterize the physical state of the missing baryons at low redshift by analyzing the X-ray absorption spectra of the Gamma Ray Burst [GRB] afterglows, measured by a micro calorimeters-based…

We discuss physical properties and the baryonic content of the Warm-hot Intergalactic Medium (WHIM) at low redshifts. Cosmological simulations predict that the WHIM contains a large fraction of the baryons at z=0 in the form of…

We propose a possible way to detect baryons at low redshifts from the analysis of X-ray absorption spectra of bright AGN pairs. A simple semi-analytical model to simulate the spectra is presented. We model the diffuse warm-hot intergalactic…

Using high resolution, high signal-to-noise ultraviolet spectra of the z = 0.9754 quasar PG1148+549 obtained with the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (COS) on the Hubble Space Telescope, we study the physical conditions and abundances of…

The warm-hot intergalactic medium (WHIM) at temperatures 1E5-1E7 K is believed to contain 30-50% of the baryons in the local universe. However, all current X-ray detections of the WHIM at redshifts z>0 are of low statistical significance…

O VI absorption is observed in a wide range of astrophysical environments, including the Local ISM, the disk and halo of the Milky Way, high-velocity clouds, the Magellanic clouds, starburst galaxies, the intergalactic medium, damped…

We use new UV and optical spectra and an archival HST-WFPC2 image to study the z_a~z_e absorber in the z_e = 0.20 QSO PKS 2135-147. The UV spectra, obtained with HST-FOS, show strong z_a~z_e absorption lines of C IV, N V, O VI, Ly-alpha and…

We review our attempts to discover lost baryons at low redshift with ``X-ray forest'' of absorption lines from the warm-hot intergalactic medium. We discuss the best evidence to date along the Mrk 421 sightline. We then discuss the missing…

We present results from the analysis of a multiphase O VI - broad Ly-alpha absorber at z = 0.19236 in the HST/COS spectrum of PG 1121+422. The low and intermediate ionization metal lines in this absorber have a single narrow component,…

Ultraviolet observations of the QSO 3C 263 (zem = 0.652) with COS and FUSE reveal O VI absorption systems at z = 0.06342 and 0.14072 . WIYN multi-object spectrograph observations provide information about the galaxies associated with the…

The O VI ion observed in quasar absorption line spectra is the most accessible tracer of the cosmic metal distribution in the low redshift (z<0.5) intergalactic medium (IGM). We explore the nature and origin of O VI absorbers using…

We describe a survey for OVI absorption in the spectra of 5 high redshift quasars (2.2 < z < 2.8). We identify 12 cosmological systems, and 6 systems that are either ejected from the background QSO or affected by its local radiation field.…

We have conducted the first survey for Oxygen VI $\lambda\lambda 1032,1038$ absorption lines in QSO spectra. We used medium resolution ($R \approx 1300$) high signal-to-noise ($\approx 20$) Faint Object Spectrograph spectra of 11 QSOs…

We present a survey for low-ionization metal absorption line systems towards 17 QSOs at redshifts z_em=5.8-6.4. Nine of our objects were observed at high resolution with either Keck/HIRES or Magellan/MIKE, and the remainder at moderate…

We have used the Hubble/STIS and FUSE archives of ultraviolet spectra of bright AGN to identify intergalactic Lya absorbers in nearby (z < 0.1) voids. From a parent sample of 651 Lya absorbers, we identified 61 void absorbers located more…

We report on the detection of a population of weak metal-line absorbers in the halo or nearby intergalactic environment of the Milky Way. Using high-resolution ultraviolet absorption-line spectra of bright QSOs obtained with the Space…