Some implications of a new value for the primordial solar deuterium-hydrogen ratio.

Some astrophysical implications of a primordial solar D/H ratio of 0.000015 are investigated. Perhaps the most interesting aspects of the D/H ratio concern galactic evolution and cosmology. It is shown that the initial galactic abundance of deuterium exceeds by at least a factor of 30 the abundance expected from known galactic production mechanisms. If a Friedmann cosmology is a correct description of the universe, it must be an open one unless some as yet unknown mechanism is invo ked to produce deuterium and He-3.