Prior to the launch of Herschel, HCl was the only chlorine-containing molecule detected in the interstellar medium (ISM). However, chemical models have identified chloronium, H2Cl, as a relatively abundant species that is potentially detectable. H2Cl was predicted to be most abundant in the environments where the ultraviolet radiation is strong: in diffuse clouds, or near the surfaces of dense ...

Dust plays an increasingly important role in astrophysics. Historically, dust was first recognized for its obscuring effects, and the need to correct observed intensities for attenuation by dust continues today. But with the increasing sensitivity of IR, FIR, and submm telescopes, dust is increasingly important as a diagnostic, with its emission spectrum providing an indicator of physical condi...

Formic acid is much more abundant in the solid state, both in interstellar ices and cometary ices, than in the interstellar gas (ice/gas ∼ 104) and this point remains a puzzle. The goal of this work is to experimentally study ionization and photodissociation processes of HCOOH (formic acid), a glycine precursor molecule. The measurements were taken at the Brazilian Synchrotron Light Laboratory ...

The questions of how and in what form that carbon is distributed in the Universe are critical ones for understanding the evolution of dust and planets, and for elucidating the origin of life on Earth and the prospects for discovering it elsewhere in the cosmos. While the abundant CI and CII atoms and CO molecule, which together account for a large fraction of the total carbon budget, have been ...

Context. Laboratory spectral recordings and an accurate molecular spectral analysis of any potential interstellar molecule are essential for generating a complete spectroscopic line list. This permits predicting the frequencies and intensities of any transition so that subsequently, it can be identified in the interstellar medium. Aims. Our analysis of DCOOCH3 aims to provide a comprehensive sp...

The wavelength dependences of interstellar extinction and polarization, supplemented by observed elemental abundances and the spectrum of infrared emission from dust heated by starlight, strongly constrain dust models. One dust model that appears to be consistent with observations is presented. To reproduce the observed extinction, the model consumes the bulk of interstellar Mg, Si, and Fe (in ...

Observations of radio signals from distant pulsars provide a valuable tool for investigation of interstellar turbulence. The time shapes of the signals are the result of pulse broadening by the fluctuating electron density in the interstellar medium. While the scaling of the shapes with the signal frequency is well understood, the observed anomalous scaling with respect to the pulsar distance h...

Carbon monoxide is the second most abundant molecule on icy grains in the interstellar medium. It also exists on Pluto, Triton, comets, and possibly in other icy bodies of the outer solar system like Kuiper Belt objects. With the intense radiation fields that permeate virtually all unprotected regions of space, carbon monoxide ices can be processed through energetic particle bombardment (planet...

The reaction between ground state carbon atoms, C~P j), and acetylene, C2H2~ (g ), was studied at an average collision energy of ~8.460.3! kJ mol using the crossed molecular beam technique. The product angular distribution and time-of-flight spectra of m/z537, i.e., C3H, were recorded. Only m/z537 was detected, but no signal from the thermodynamically accessible C3~ (g )1H2( (g ) channel. Forwa...