ON THE ORIGIN OF THE CLUSTERED QUASI-STELLAR OBJECT METAL ABSORPTION-LINES

Observations show that there is significant clustering of QSO metal absorption lines within the range of velocity dispersion between 200 km s(-1) and 600 km s(-1). With a reasonable supernova rate, it is shown that high-velocity gases driven by SNe and/or strong stellar winds could explain the clustered absorptions, provided that QSO metal-line absorbers are galactic halos or dwarf galaxies. Rich clusters of galaxies, on the other hand, cannot yield the observed clustering of QSO metal absorption lines.