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Description
Spectroscopy of 10 quasars obtained with the Goddard High Resolution Spectrograph (GHRS) of the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) is presented. In the 10 sight lines, we detect 357 absorption lines above a significance level of 3{sigma} and 272 lines above a significance level of 4.5{sigma}. Automated software is used to detect and identify the lines, almost all of which are unresolved at the GHRS G140L resolution of 200km/s. After identifying Galactic lines, intervening metal lines, and higher order Lyman lines, we are left with 139 Ly{alpha} absorbers in the redshift range 0<z<0.22 (lines within 900km/s of geocoronal Ly{alpha} are not selected). These diffuse hydrogen absorbers have column densities that are mostly in the range 10^13^-10^15^cm^-2^ for an assumed Doppler parameter of 30km/s. The number density of lines above a rest equivalent width of 0.24{AA}, dN/dz=38.3{+/-}5.3, agrees well with the measurement from the Quasar Absorption-Line Key Project. There is marginal evidence for cosmic variance in the number of absorbers detected among the 10 sight lines.
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