Ionized Gas in the First 10 Kiloparsecs of the Interstellar Galactic Halo: Metal Ion Fractions. (arXiv:1209.4640v1 [astro-ph.GA])

Ionized Gas in the First 10 Kiloparsecs of the Interstellar Galactic Halo: Metal Ion Fractions. (arXiv:1209.4640v1 [astro-ph.GA]):
We present direct measures of the ionization fractions of several sulfur ions
in the Galactic warm ionized medium (WIM). We obtained high resolution
ultraviolet absorption line spectroscopy of post-asymptotic giant branch stars
in the the globular clusters Messier 3 [(l,b)=(42.2, +78.7); d=10.2 kpc, z=10.0
kpc] and Messier 5 [(l,b)=(3.9, +46.8); d=7.5 kpc, z = +5.3 kpc] with the
Hubble Space Telescope and Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer to measure,
or place limits on, the column densities of S I, S II, S III, S IV, S VI, and H
I. These clusters also house millisecond pulsars, whose dispersion measures
give an electron column density from which we infer the H II column in these
directions. We find fractions of S+2 in the WIM for the M 3 and M 5 sight lines
x(S+2) = N(S+2)/N(S) = 0.33+/-0.07 and 0.47+/-0.09, respectively, with
variations perhaps related to location. With negligible quantities of the
higher ionization states, we conclude S+ and S+2 account for all of the S in
the WIM. We extend the methodology to study the ion fractions in the warm and
hot ionized gas of the Milky Way, including the high ions Si+3, C+3, N+4, and
O+5. The vast majority of the Galactic ionized gas is warm (T ~ 10^4 K) and
photoionized (the WIM) or very hot (T > 4x10^5 K) and collisionally ionized.
The common tracer of ionized gas beyond the Milky Way, O+5, traces <1% of the
total ionized gas mass of the Milky Way.