Heriot-Watt to lead European astrochemistry consortium

A Heriot-Watt academic has helped secure a £5.5 million (€6.1 million) funding award for a Europe-wide, cross-disciplinary research consortium into the formation of stars and, potentially, the origins of life

The university is to lead LASSIE (Laboratory Astrochemistry Surface Science in Europe), an Initial Training Network funded under Marie Curie Actions within the European Commissions Seventh Framework Program.

It will consist of thirteen academic groups in the UK and Europe, with the only other Scottish university involved being Strathclyde.

LASSIE is intended to help early-stage researchers in astrochemistry embark upon a research career, but Professor Martin McCoustra, Chair in Chemical Physics at Heriot Watt and one of the researchers who helped secure this prestigious award, told The Journal why this area is so important:

"This goes back about fifteen years, from conversations between chemists and astronomers."

Five industrial partners and one partner with expertise in outreach, Graphic Science, completes the team.

He and a group of scientists have been investigating the formation and behaviour of molecules on dust in dense regions of interstellar medium since about the mid-1990's, in a network called AstroSurf based at University College London.

Prof McCoustra explains: "One question was: What role do these molecules have? Well, if you take the molecules out—particularly the small ones—you can't make small stars. Our sun wouldn't exist. Small stars live long lives, and that gives the chance for life."

According to McCoustra, none of the chemistry taught at school can currently explain how molecules are made in the environment of these 'dense regions': they're very cold, there is extremely low pressure, and—contrary to their name—there is low density compared to Earth.

But surprisingly there is a very wide variety of molecules, which have been discovered since the 1930's.

Known chemistry of the interstellar gas especially has trouble explaining small molecules like molecular hydrogen, but "put icy dust there and we can make it and other small molecules crucial to star formation".

Many astronomers used to view the icy dust as a nuisance, but Prof McCoustra believes they could hold information about the origins of life.

He says there were several questions which they present: "How do we accumulate ice on these dust grains? How does that ice then get processed by the radiation field in the interstellar medium? By the cosmic rays, by the light. If you take simple ice, and irradiate it long enough with ultraviolet rays and  amino acids—the building blocks of life—are formed."

Prof McCoustra said that the goal of this research is to put together a picture of how the grains determine the chemistry of these dense regions and how it contributes to star formation.

This may also tell us how it potentially contributes to providing a young planet with the building blocks for life.