Exploring the formation pathways of formamide

Astronomy and Astrophysics, vol. 636, pp. A67

Abstract

Context.As a building block for amino acids, formamide (NH2CHO) is an important molecule in astrobiology and astrochemistry, but its formation path in the interstellar medium is not understood well. Aims.We aim to find empirical evidence to support the chemical relationships of formamide to HNCO and H2CO. Methods.We examine high angular resolution (~0.2″) Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array maps of six sources in three high-mass star-forming regions and compare the spatial extent, integrated emission peak position, and velocity structure of HNCO and H2CO line emission with that of NH2CHO by using moment maps. Through spectral modeling, we compare the abundances of these three species. Results.In these sources, the emission peak separation and velocity dispersion of formamide emission is most often similar to HNCO emission, while the velocity structure is generally just as similar to H2CO and HNCO (within errors). From the spectral modeling, we see that the abundances between all three of our focus species are correlated, and the relationship between NH2CHO and HNCO reproduces the previously demonstrated abundance relationship. Conclusions.In this first interferometric study, which compares two potential parent species to NH2CHO, we find that all moment maps for HNCO are more similar to NH2CHO than H2CO in one of our six sources (G24 A1). For the other five sources, the relationship between NH2CHO, HNCO, and H2CO is unclear as the different moment maps for each source are not consistently more similar to one species as opposed to the other.

Authors 6

1. V. Allen Aachen

   Goddard Space Flight Center · University of Groningen · Space Research Organisation Netherlands

   Affiliation as printed

   Kapteyn Astronomical Institute, University of Groningen, Landleven 12, 9747 AD Groningen, The Netherlands

   NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, 8800 Greenbelt Road, Greenbelt, MD 20771, USA

   SRON, Landleven 12, 9747 AD Groningen, The Netherlands

2. Floris F. S. van der Tak Aachen

   University of Groningen · Space Research Organisation Netherlands

   Affiliation as printed

   Kapteyn Astronomical Institute, University of Groningen, Landleven 12, 9747 AD Groningen, The Netherlands

   SRON, Landleven 12, 9747 AD Groningen, The Netherlands

3. Ana López-Sepulcre

   Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique · Institut de Planétologie et d'Astrophysique de Grenoble · Ausonius Institut de Recherche sur l'Antiquité et le Moyen age · Université Grenoble Alpes

   Affiliation as printed

   CNRS, IPAG, Univ. Grenoble Alpes, 38000 Grenoble, France

   IRAM, 300 rue de la Piscine, 38406 Saint-Martin d’Hères, France

   IRAM, 300 rue de la Piscine, 38406 Saint-Martin d'Hères, France

4. Á. Sánchez-Monge

   University of Cologne

   Affiliation as printed

   I. Physikalisches Institut, Universität zu Köln, Zülpicher Straße 77, 50937 Köln, Germany

5. V. M. Rivilla

   Arcetri Astrophysical Observatory · National Institute for Astrophysics

   Affiliation as printed

   INAF, Osservatorio Astrofisico di Arcetri, Largo Enrico Fermi 5, 50125 Florence, Italy

6. R. Cesaroni

   Arcetri Astrophysical Observatory · National Institute for Astrophysics

   Affiliation as printed

   INAF, Osservatorio Astrofisico di Arcetri, Largo Enrico Fermi 5, 50125 Florence, Italy