{"id":102949,"date":"2019-09-10T14:51:25","date_gmt":"2019-09-11T00:51:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=102949"},"modified":"2019-09-11T13:57:34","modified_gmt":"2019-09-11T23:57:34","slug":"new-pathway-for-carbon-chemistry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2019\/09\/10\/new-pathway-for-carbon-chemistry\/","title":{"rendered":"Scientists reveal new pathway for carbon chemistry to evolve in space"},"content":{"rendered":"Reading time: <\/span> 2<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span>
\"machines\"
Experimental setup at the Chemical Dynamics Beamline of the Advanced Light Source (ALS<\/abbr>) incorporating the chemical micro reactor exploited in the present studies.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A team of scientists led by University of Hawaiʻi<\/span> at M\u0101noa<\/a> Professor Ralf Kaiser<\/strong> has discovered a new possible pathway toward forming carbon structures in space using a specialized chemical exploration technique at the Department of Energy\u2019s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory<\/a> (Berkeley Lab\u2019s Advanced Light Source<\/a>). The team also included computational chemists from Florida International University. <\/p>\n

In the study, published in Nature Communications<\/em><\/a>, researchers produced a ringed, carbon-containing molecule by combining two highly reactive chemical species that are called free radicals because they contain unpaired electrons. <\/p>\n

The team\u2019s research has now identified several key avenues by which ringed molecules known as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, or PAHs<\/abbr>, can form in space. <\/p>\n

PAHs<\/abbr>—which also occur on Earth in emissions and soot from the combustion of fossil fuels—could provide clues to the formation of life\u2019s chemistry in space as precursors to interstellar nanoparticles.<\/p>\n

The study ultimately showed how these chemical processes could lead to the development of carbon-containing graphene-type PAHs and 2D<\/abbr> nanostructures. Graphene is a one-dimensional layer of fused hexagons consisting of carbon atoms. <\/p>\n

“This is something that people have tried to measure experimentally at high temperatures for decades but have not done successfully before,” said Musahid Ahmed, a scientist in Berkeley Lab\u2019s Chemical Sciences Division. “ We believe this is yet another pathway that can give rise to PAHs.”<\/p>\n

Kaiser added, “The present experiment clearly provides scientific evidence that reactions between radicals at elevated temperatures do form aromatic molecules such as naphthalene.”<\/p>\n

The latest study is part of an ongoing effort of the Hawaiʻi<\/span>-Berkeley-Florida team to retrace the chemical steps leading to the formation of complex carbon-containing molecules in deep space up to all-carbon-containing soccer-shaped buckyball molecules.<\/p>\n

Read the full news release for more on the discovery.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Researchers produced a ringed, carbon-containing molecule by combining two highly reactive chemical species that are called free radicals because they contain unpaired electrons.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[251,308,1363,158,174,9],"class_list":["post-102949","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-research","tag-chemistry","tag-college-of-natural-sciences","tag-manoa-research","tag-publication","tag-space","tag-uh-manoa","entry","has-media"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t