Mapping Ices on 1000 AU Scales in Pre-Stellar Cores
by
Helen Fraser(Dept. of Physics, Univ. of Strathclyde, Glasgow, UK)
→
Europe/Stockholm
FA31
FA31
Description
Although the presence of ice in cold, dark regions of the interstellar medium is now well established through observational spectra and its requirements as a molecular 'sink' in the modelling of star-formation chemistry, observational astronomy has yet to exploit this repository to tie down prevailing physical and chemical conditions and use ices to trace the star-formation process.
We know the major consituents of ices, H2O, CO2 and CO, yet have little understanding of exactly how and where these materials form, or at what rate, and coupled to exactly which gases. More minor species, e.g. NH3, CH3OH, oCS and HCOOH are even harder to identify and place constraints on. With the advent of 8-m class telescopes, and recent high-sensitivity space telescopes such as SPITZER and AKARI, we have been able, for the first time, to move from 1-D spectra of ices in our sight-line to 2D spatial maps of the distribution of ices in space. This powerful technique offers us the opportunity to start to use ices as mapping tools of star-forming regions.
Here I will present some key ice-mapping results and questions they raise, and illustrate the prospects for ice-mapping in the near future, through two key programme son the AKARI IR satellite. I will also illustrate how observational astronomy provides questions to laboratory and theoretical astrochemists, and visa versa.
