Astrochemistry

© Courtesy NASA/JPL/R. Hurt (SSC)

Helen Fraser, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, UK

Programme:

Monday 3 August (morning and afternoon)

Tuesday 4 August (morning and afternoon)

Wednesday 5 August (morning)

Keynote Speakers

Calculations on surface reactions and their astrophysical implications
David Clary, University of Oxford, UK 

The current status of chemical networks for simulating interstellar chemistry
Eric Herbst, The Ohio State University, USA

Laboratory studies of nanoscale films of amorphous solid water
Bruce D. Kay, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, USA

Laboratory investigations of Titan chemistry
Stephen R. Leone, University of California, Berkeley and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, USA 

Chemistry during star- and planet formation
Ewine van Dishoeck, Leiden University, The Netherlands

Speakers

Exploring the chemical and physical structure of terrestrial planet-forming zones in protoplanetary disks with CO line profiles
J. Bast, Leiden University, The Netherlands

A solution to earth's missing carbon
Edwin A. Bergin, University of Michigan, USA

From PAH molecules to carbon particles in circumstellar envelopes: insights from laboratory experiments
Ludovic Biennier, Université de Rennes 1, France

Surface science investigations of OCS containing model interstellar ices
Wendy A. Brown, University College London, UK

Thermal desorption from porous dust grain surfaces
Mark P. Collings, Heriot-Watt University, UK

Experimental studies of the morphology of water and its implications under interstellar conditions
Francois Dulieu, Universite de Cergy-Pontoise, France

A new modified-rate method for surface chemistry: comparison with Monte Carlo results
Robin T. Garrod, Cornell University, USA

Nitrile chemistry in Interstellar Clouds and Titan's atmosphere 
Wolf D. Geppert, Stockholm University, Sweden 

C-chain anions as tracers of circumstellar chemistry
M. Guélin, IRAM, France

Molecular hydrogen formation in the interstellar medium
Liv Hornekaer, University of Aarhus, Denmark 

Molecular anions in the laboratory and in space
M.C. McCarthy, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, USA

2D mapping of ice species in molecular cores
Jennifer A. Noble, University of Strathclyde, UK

Deuterium chemistry and gas-grain interactions in star-forming regions
Helen Roberts, Queen's University Belfast, UK

Laboratory investigation on water formation routes in interstellar ices analogues
Claire Romanzin, Leiden University, The Netherlands

Chemical evolution of protoplanetary disks as revealed by observations and modeling
Dmitry A. Semenov, Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, Germany

Ices around extragalactic young stellar objects
Takashi Shimonishi, University of Tokyo, Japan

Chemical reactivity at extremely low temperatures: rate coefficients for S(1D) + H2 down to 5.8 K
Ian R. Sims, Universite de Rennes 1, France

The chemistry of protoplanetary disks
Catherine Walsh, Queen's University Belfast, UK

New THz spectroscopic tools for tracing prebiotic interstellar chemistry
Susanna L. Widicus Weaver, Emory University, USA

Symposium Information

Astrochemistry is the science that combines chemistry and astronomy, and has, over the past decade, proved a formidable interdisciplinary subject, attracting researchers from chemistry and astronomy, as well as physics, biology, materials and geosciences. The field holds huge potential to chemists as a place where their science can evolve, cross boundaries and to strike up new collaborations and applications.

From an astronomical perspective, our understanding of our local universe relies on spectroscopic techniques, light absorbed and emitted by atoms and molecules in distant stars and galaxies, or interstellar and intergalactic space, is key to elucidating the temperature, density and dynamical profiles of regions of star and planet formation as well as extra-galactic structure. Astronomers therefore require detailed data on atomic and molecular spectra, but also use the chemical evolution of astronomical objects as a 'clock', and such applications require detailed understanding of chemical reactions, rates, branching, and of chemical processes occurring in 'extreme' extraterrestrial conditions.

From a chemical perspective, research in Astrochemistry encompasses a wide range of chemical physics fields, from direct molecular detection and laboratory spectroscopy, through non-Arrhenius behaviour in neutral-neutral reactions at low pressures and temperatures in the gas phase, to surface chemistry, involving electron and photon induced surface processes as well as studies of surface reactivity and desorption at low temperatures.

2009 is the International Year of Astronomy, and seems a very appropriate time to bring Astrochemistry to the wider chemical research audience - work on doubly charged ions, combustion chemistry, nano-particle catalysis and condensed matter all has a bearing on the chemistry of star and planet formation and the potential for extraterrestrial life.