The Iron Project \& The Opacity Project: 1. Photoionization of Fe ions for Opacities, 2. P II in exoplanetary environments

1. At the radiative and convection boundary in the Sun iron opacity depends on Fe~XVII-Fe~XIX. With the aim of resolving the outstanding discrepancy in theoretical solar iron opacity and measurements at the Sandia Z-pinch ICF device, large-scale calculations for photoionization cross sections and transition probabilities have been carried out using the Breit-Pauli R-Matrix (BPRM) method, including the heretofore neglected autoionization resonance features and resulting opacity enhancement. Fe~XVII BPRM calculations include 218 coupled fine structure levels in the Fe~XVIII target wavefunction expansion, and Fe~XVIII calculations include 276 levels of Fe~XIX. It is found that huge Seaton resonances due to photoexcitation-of-core (PEC) make the dominant contribution to bound-free opacity. Hitherto, these are among the most complex R-Matrix calculations. Convergence and completeness of coupled channel calculations is also addressed. 2. Phosphorus is one of the elements of DNA-based lifeforms. Its abundance in exoplanetary environments may indicate spectral biosignatures. We will report new BPRM calculations for collisional data for P~II and predicted spectrum of P~II in the wavelength region of interest.