Astron. Astrophys. 358, L67-L70 (2000)

4. Conclusions

This Letter makes plausible that the long-standing puzzle of the underproduction with respect to solar of the p-isotopes of Mo and Ru in SNII explosions could be quite naturally solved by just assuming an increase of the rate over its `nominal' value. More specifically, this could be achieved by multiplying the NACRE `adopted' rate by factors of about 10 to 50 in the temperature range at which the s-process typically develops during core He burning in massive stars. These factors are well within the uncertainties reported by NACRE. As an important bonus, this increased rate would also largely avoid (i) the underproduction of and of which we predict here for the first time to be concomitant to the light Mo and Ru one, (ii) the too low production of and , and (iii) the overall underproduction of the p-nuclides with respect to oxygen noted by RAHPN. In direct relation with an increased rate, more s-process Ba could also be ejected by SNII events. Our predictions confortably overlap the range of Ba overabundances reported for SN1987.

This array of pleasing features has of course not to be viewed as a proof of the validity of the assumption that the true rate is higher than usually thought. It may just be a hint that there might be ways around exotic solutions. This conclusion applies at least if one relies on the simplistic (and the only ones to be available for our purpose) supernova models used here and in previous p-process calculations (see RAHPN et references therein), as well as in a myriad of other explosive nucleosynthesis calculations.

© European Southern Observatory (ESO) 2000

Online publication: June 20, 2000
helpdesk.link@springer.de