2005/03/28 by Akihiro Nagaoka, Naoki Watanabe, Akira Kouchi · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · #Advanced Chemical Physics Studies #Astrochemistry #Astrophysics and Star Formation Studies #Cosmochemistry #Deuterium #Fractionation #Interstellar medium #Methanol #Molecule #Quantum, superfluid, helium dynamics #astro-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1086/430304
published as Astrophys.J. 624 (2005) L29-L32 · 4 pages, 4 figures, Accepted to the ApJL
arxiv created 2005/03/28 · openalex publication_date 2005/03/28 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Deuterium enrichment of interstellar methanol is reproduced experimentally for the first time via grain-surface H-D substitution in solid methanol at an atomic D/H ratio of 0.1. Although previous gas-grain models successfully reproduce the deuterium enrichments observed in interstellar methanol molecules (D/H of up to 0.4, compared to the cosmic ratio of ~10 -5 ), the models exclusively focus on deuterium fractionation resulting from the successive addition of atomic hydrogen/deuterium on CO. The mechanism proposed here represents a key route for deuterium enrichment that reproduces the high observed abundances of deuterated methanol, including multiple deuterations.