ICRAR: Hunting Molecules with the Murchison Widefield Array

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Hunting Molecules with the Murchison Widefield Array
International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research | 2017 Jul 21

[img3="This image shows the centre of the Milky Way as seen by the Galactic Centre Molecular Line Survey. Credit: Chenoa Tremblay (ICRAR-Curtin)"]https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com ... hanged.png[/img3][hr][/hr]

Astronomers have used an Australian radio telescope to observe molecular signatures from stars, gas and dust in our galaxy, which could lead to the detection of complex molecules that are precursors to life.

Using the Murchison Widefield Array (MWA), a radio telescope located in the Murchison region of Western Australia, the team successfully detected two molecules called the mercapto radical (SH) and nitric oxide (NO).

“The molecular transitions we saw are from slow variable stars—stars at the end of their lives that are becoming unstable,” said Chenoa Tremblay from the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR) and Curtin University.

“We use molecules to probe the Milky Way, to better understand the chemical and physical environments of stars, gas and dust,” she said.

“One of the unique aspects of this survey is that until now, no one has ever reported detections of molecules within the 70-300MHz frequency range of the MWA and this is the widest field-of-view molecular survey of the Milky Way ever published.” ...

A First Look for Molecules between 103 and 133 MHz using the Murchison Widefield Array - Chenoa D. Tremblay et al

• Monthly Notices of the RAS (online 20 Jul 2017) DOI: 10.1093/mnras/stx1838
  arXiv.org > astro-ph > arXiv:1707.06009 > 19 Jul 2017

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<<Free radicals derived from mercaptans, called thiyl or thiol radical or mercapto radical, are commonly invoked to explain reactions in organic chemistry and biochemistry. They have the formula RS• where R is an organic substituent such as alkyl or aryl. The spray of skunks consists mainly of low-molecular-weight thiols and derivatives. Owls can prey on skunks as they are unable to smell the thiols. Thiols are the sulfur analogue of alcohols (that is, sulfur takes the place of oxygen in the hydroxyl group of an alcohol), and the word is a portmanteau of "thion" + "alcohol," with the first word deriving from Greek θεῖον (theion) = "sulfur". Many thiols have strong odors resembling that of garlic or rotten eggs. Thiols are used as odorants to assist in the detection of natural gas (which in pure form is odorless), and the "smell of natural gas" is due to the smell of the thiol used as the odorant. Thiols are sometimes referred to as mercaptans. The term mercaptan was introduced in 1832 by William Christopher Zeise and is derived from the Latin mercurium captāns (capturing mercury) because the thiolate group bonds very strongly with mercury compounds.>>