Laboratory Simulation of Chemical Reactions in Interstellar Ices

Abstract

The reactions of H atoms with solid thin films at 10 K were studied by using thermal desorption mass spectrometry and FT-IR spectroscopy. The N, C, and O atoms trapped in solid matrices were converted efficiently to fully hydrogenated compounds. In the reaction of H atoms with a solid CO film, the formation of formaldehyde and methanol were confirmed. The relatively low yield of the reaction products suggests either the smaller rate constants of the H atom addition reactions to CO and/or the occurrence of the hydrogen abstraction reaction H + HCO → H2+ CO. The reactions of H atoms with thin films of acetone and 2-propanol were also studied. The major products from acetone were found to be methane and alcohols but 2-propanol was not detected as a reaction product. The reaction of H with 2-propanol led to the formation of methane, alcohols, and acetone as major products.In the reaction of H with C2H2, C2H6was found to be the major product but C2H4could not be detected. This is due to the fact that the first-step addition reaction H + C2H2→ C2H3is the rate-controlling process and the following reactions to form the final product C2H6proceed much faster than the initial one. This finding is in accord with the observation of comets Hyakutake and Hale-Bopp, i.e., C2H2and C2H6but not C2H4were detected in the coma of these comets. In the reactions of H with C2H2and C2H4, the C2H6product yields increased drastically with decrease of temperature from 50 to 10 K. This is most likely due to the increase of the sticking probability of H atoms on the solid films at lower temperature. These findings led us to conclude that the chemical evolution taking place on the dust grains via H-atom tunneling reactions becomes efficient only at cryogenic temperatures, i.e., ~ 10 K.