The role of grains in molecular chemical evolution

Abstract

The observations of dust gas in diffuse and molecular clouds are shown to reflect not only their current state but their past history. The interpretation of infrared spectra of dust in molecular clouds using appropriate core-mantle grains shows that: (1) the kinds and amounts of ices, (2) the relative proportion of such important interstellar molecules as H2O and CO, (3) the evidence for the less abundant solid species X−C≡N, COS, H2S, and (4) the thermal history of the dust may all be demonstrated quantitatively from laboratory analog studies of ultraviolet photoprocessing of relevant ices and from theoretical studies of gas-dust interactions. In diffuse clouds the dust is shown to consist predominantly of refractory organic compounds which originate as residues of the photoprocessing of volatile ices in molecular clouds and which undergo further physical and chemical evolution in the diffuse clouds.