A DETERMINATION OF THE SOLAR ABUNDANCE OF IRON FROM FAINT FE-I LINES

We determine the solar abundance of iron from faint Fe I lines whose f -values have been determined in a branching ratio experiment and refer enced directly to the Oxford f-value scare. The damping constants for the lines have been determined from a new theory for line broadening b y collisions with neutral hydrogen and the abundances from individual lines have been determined by spectrum synthesis rather than by direct ly fitting the equivalent width of the lines. The derived abundance of iron is log N(Fe) = 7.54(sigma = 0.05) which is in good agreement wit h recent determinations based on both Fe I and Fe II lines lending fur ther independent support to a low value of the photospheric iron abund ance in agreement with the meteoritic value.