Edith C. Fayolle

Publications (5)9.1 Total impact

• Article: The Spatial Distribution of Organics toward the High-Mass YSO NGC 7538 IRS9

  Karin I. Oberg, Mavis Dufie Boamah, Edith C. Fayolle, Robin T. Garrod, Claudia Cyganowski, Floris van der Tak
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  ABSTRACT: Based on astrochemical theory, the complex molecular composition around high-mass YSOs should evolve from the outer envelope in toward the central hot region as a sequence of temperature dependent chemical pathways are activated in ices and in the gas-phase. The resulting complex molecules have been broadly classified into three generations dependent on the temperature (<25, >25, and >100 K) required for formation. We combine IRAM 30m and Submillimeter Array observations to explore the spatial distribution of organic molecules around the high-mass young stellar object NGC 7538 IRS9, whose weak complex molecule emission previously escaped detection, quantifying the emission and abundance profiles of key organic molecules as a function of distance from the central protostar. We find that emission from N-bearing organics and saturated O-bearing organics present large increases in emission around 8000 AU and R<3000 AU, while O-bearing molecules and hydrocarbons do not. The increase in flux from some complex molecules in the envelope, around 8000 AU or 25 K, is consistent with recent model predictions of an onset of complex ice chemistry at 20-30 K. The emission increase for some molecules at R<3000 AU suggests the presence of a weak hot core, where thermal ice evaporation and hot gas-phase chemistry drives the chemistry. Complex organics thus form at all radii and temperatures around this protostar, but the composition changes dramatically as the temperature increases, which is used to constrain the chemical generation(s) to which different classes of molecule belong.
  05/2013;
• Source

  Available from: Mathieu Bertin

  Article: UV photodesorption of interstellar CO ice analogues: from subsurface excitation to surface desorption.

  Mathieu Bertin, Edith C Fayolle, Claire Romanzin, Karin I Öberg, Xavier Michaut, Audrey Moudens, Laurent Philippe, Pascal Jeseck, Harold Linnartz, Jean-Hugues Fillion
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  ABSTRACT: Carbon monoxide is after H(2) the most abundant molecule identified in the interstellar medium (ISM), and is used as a major tracer for the gas phase physical conditions. Accreted at the surface of water-rich icy grains, CO is considered to be the starting point of a complex organic--presumably prebiotic--chemistry. Non-thermal desorption processes, and especially photodesorption by UV photons, are seen as the main cause that drives the gas-to-ice CO balance in the colder parts of the ISM. The process is known to be efficient and wavelength-dependent, but, the underlying mechanism and the physical-chemical parameters governing the photodesorption are still largely unknown. Using monochromatized photons from a synchrotron beamline, we reveal that the molecular mechanism responsible for CO photoejection is an indirect, (sub)surface-located process. The local environment of the molecules plays a key role in the photodesorption efficiency, and is quenched by at least an order of magnitude for CO interacting with a water ice surface.
  Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics 06/2012; 14(28):9929-35. · 3.57 Impact Factor
• Source

  Available from: Mathieu Bertin

  Article: CO Ice Photodesorption: A Wavelength-dependent Study

  Edith C. Fayolle, Mathieu Bertin, Claire Romanzin, Xavier Michaut, Karin I. Öberg, Harold Linnartz, and Jean-Hugues Fillion
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  ABSTRACT: UV-induced photodesorption of ice is a non-thermal evaporation process that can explain the presence of cold molecular gas in a range of interstellar regions. Information on the average UV photodesorption yield of astrophysically important ices exists for broadband UV lamp experiments. UV fields around low-mass pre-main-sequence stars, around shocks and in many other astrophysical environments are however often dominated by discrete atomic and molecular emission lines. It is therefore crucial to consider the wavelength dependence of photodesorption yields and mechanisms. In this work, for the first time, the wavelength-dependent photodesorption of pure CO ice is explored between 90 and 170 nm. The experiments are performed under ultra high vacuum conditions using tunable synchrotron radiation. Ice photodesorption is simultaneously probed by infrared absorption spectroscopy in reflection mode of the ice and by quadrupole mass spectrometry of the gas phase. The experimental results for CO reveal a strong wavelength dependence directly linked to the vibronic transition strengths of CO ice, implying that photodesorption is induced by electronic transition (DIET). The observed dependence on the ice absorption spectra implies relatively low photodesorption yields at 121.6 nm (Lyα), where CO barely absorbs, compared to the high yields found at wavelengths coinciding with transitions into the first electronic state of CO (A1Π at 150 nm); the CO photodesorption rates depend strongly on the UV profiles encountered in different star formation environments.
  The Astrophysical Journal Letters 08/2011; 739(2):L36. · 5.53 Impact Factor
• Article: Solid State Pathways towards Molecular Complexity in Space

  Harold Linnartz, Jean-Baptiste Bossa, Jordy Bouwman, Herma M. Cuppen, Steven H. Cuylle, Ewine F. van Dishoeck, Edith C. Fayolle, Gleb Fedoseev, Guido W. Fuchs, Sergio Ioppolo, Karoliina Isokoski, Thanja Lamberts, Karin I. Öberg, Claire Romanzin, Emily Tenenbaum, Junfeng Zhen
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  ABSTRACT: It has been a long standing problem in astrochemistry to explain how molecules can form in a highly dilute environment such as the interstellar medium. In the last decennium more and more evidence has been found that the observed mix of small and complex, stable and highly transient species in space is the cumulative result of gas phase and solid state reactions as well as gas-grain interactions. Solid state reactions on icy dust grains are specifically found to play an important role in the formation of the more complex “organic” compounds. In order to investigate the underlying physical and chemical processes detailed laboratory based experiments are needed that simulate surface reactions triggered by processes as different as thermal heating, photon (UV) irradiation and particle (atom, cosmic ray, electron) bombardment of interstellar ice analogues. Here, some of the latest research performed in the Sackler Laboratory for Astrophysics in Leiden, the Netherlands is reviewed. The focus is on hydrogenation, i.e., H-atom addition reactions and vacuum ultraviolet irradiation of interstellar ice analogues at astronomically relevant temperatures. It is shown that solid state processes are crucial in the chemical evolution of the interstellar medium, providing pathways towards molecular complexity in space.
  Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union 05/2011; 7:390 - 404.
• Source

  Available from: arxiv.org

  Article: Quantification of segregation dynamics in ice mixtures

  Karin I. Öberg, Edith C. Fayolle, Herma M. Cuppen, Ewine F. van Dishoeck, Harold Linnartz
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  ABSTRACT: (Abridged) The observed presence of pure CO2 ice in protostellar envelopes is attributed to thermally induced ice segregation, but a lack of quantitative experimental data has prevented its use as a temperature probe. Quantitative segregation studies are also needed to characterize diffusion in ices, which underpins all ice dynamics and ice chemistry. This study aims to quantify the segregation mechanism and barriers in different H2O:CO2 and H2O:CO ice mixtures covering a range of astrophysically relevant ice thicknesses and mixture ratios. The ices are deposited at 16-50 K under (ultra-)high vacuum conditions. Segregation is then monitored at 23-70 K as a function of time, through infrared spectroscopy. Thin (8-37 ML) H2O:CO2/CO ice mixtures segregate sequentially through surface processes, followed by an order of magnitude slower bulk diffusion. Thicker ices (>100 ML) segregate through a fast bulk process. The thick ices must therefore be either more porous or segregate through a different mechanism, e.g. a phase transition. The segregation dynamics of thin ices are reproduced qualitatively in Monte Carlo simulations of surface hopping and pair swapping. The experimentally determined surface-segregation rates for all mixture ratios follow the Ahrrenius law with a barrier of 1080[190] K for H2O:CO2 and 300[100] K for H2O:CO mixtures. During low-mass star formation H2O:CO2 segregation will be important already at 30[5] K. Both surface and bulk segregation is proposed to be a general feature of ice mixtures when the average bond strengths of the mixture constituents in pure ice exceeds the average bond strength in the ice mixture. Comment: Accepted for publication in A&A. 25 pages, including 13 figures
  07/2009;