Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rdxmf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-27T00:25:56.886Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

From Interstellar Matter To Comets: A Laboratory View

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 March 2016

Pascale Ehrenfreund
Affiliation:
Leiden Observatory, P O Box 9513, 2300 RA Leiden, The Netherlands
Oliver Botta
Affiliation:
Leiden Observatory, P O Box 9513, 2300 RA Leiden, The Netherlands

Abstract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

Comets, formed in the cold outer parts of the solar system, provide a record of pristine material from the parent interstellar cloud. The investigation of outgassing curves from bright comets has provided a relationship to the abundances of interstellar ices and gas phase molecules. However, being porous and stratified in various layers of different densities and temperatures, the out-gassing characteristics of comets can not always be directly reconciled with the interstellar composition. This is due to the structure of the nuclear ice component, which contains different coexisting ice phases, clathrates, and trapped gases. Ices, silicates and carbonaceous compounds – studied through astronomical observations and by laboratory simulations – serve as reference material to obtain information on cometary bulk material. A major fraction of cosmic carbon in the interstellar medium, comets and meteorites seems to be incorporated into complex aromatic networks, which are difficult to observe and to identify spectroscopically. However, recent measurements of the macromolecular structure and soluble organic species in carbonaceous meteorites provide a powerful tool to investigate the link of small bodies in the solar system.

Type
I. Joint Discussions
Copyright
Copyright © Astronomical Society of Pacific 2005

References

Botta, O., Bada, J. L. 2002, Survey in Geophysics, 23, 411 CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Botta, O. et al. 2002, OLEB 32, 697 Google Scholar
Ehrenfreund, P. et al. 2003, Planet. Space Sci. 41, 473 CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gardinier, A. et al. 2000, Earth Planet. Sci. Lett., 184, 9 CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Irvine, W. M. et al. 2000 In PPIV (Mannings, V., Boss, A., Russell, S. Eds.) 1159-1200. University of Arizona Press, Tucson.Google Scholar
Pontoppidan, K.M. et al. 2003 A&A, 408, 981 Google Scholar
Sephton, M. et al 2000 Geochim. Cosmochim. Acta 64, 321 CrossRefGoogle Scholar