Related papers: A snowflake's chance in heaven
Advanced telescopes, such as ALMA and JWST, are likely to show that the chemical universe may be even more complex than currently observed, requiring astrochemical modelers to improve their models to account for the impact of new data.…
We consider the acceleration of very small dust grains including Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAHs) arising from the electrostatic interactions of dust grains that have charge fluctuations in time due to charging events. We simulate…
A significant fraction of main sequence stars observed interferometrically in the near infrared have slightly extended components that have been attributed to very hot dust. To match the spectrum appears to require the presence of large…
Grains exposed to anisotropic radiation fields are subjected to forces due to the asymmetric photon-stimulated ejection of particles. These forces act in addition to the ``radiation pressure'' due to absorption and scattering. Here we model…
The dust cannot survive closer to the star from the point where a grain reaches a temperature equal to the sublimation temperature. The boundary between a dust-free and a dusty region defines the sublimation wall. In the literature two…
Molecular nitrogen is one of the key species in the chemistry of interstellar clouds and protoplanetary disks and the partitioning of nitrogen between N and N2 controls the formation of more complex prebiotic nitrogen-containing species.…
H2 is the simplest and the most abundant molecule in the ISM, and its formation precedes the formation of other molecules. Understanding the dynamical influence of the environment and the interplay between the thermal processes related to…
There is a need for numerical models capable of predicting local accumulation of hydrogen near stress concentrators and crack tips to prevent and mitigate hydrogen assisted fracture in steels. The experimental characterisation of trapping…
By radiation transfer models with a realistic power spectra of the projected density distributions, we show that the optical properties of grains are poorly constrained by observations of reflection nebulae. The ISM is known to be…
In protoplanetary disks, the distribution and abundance of small (sub)micron grains are important for a range of physical and chemical processes. For example, they dominate the optical depth at short wavelengths and their surfaces are the…
We investigate the formation of molecular hydrogen (H_2) in a primordial H+He gas cloud irradiated by a power-law UV flux. We find that at high densities (>1 cm^{-3}) and low temperatures (<10^4 K), the background radiation enhances the…
A broad array of interstellar absorption features that appear in the ultraviolet spectra of bright sources allows us to measure the abundances and ionization states of many important heavy elements that exist as free atoms in the…
The abundances of gas and dust (solids and complex molecules) in the interstellar medium (ISM) as well as their composition and structures impact practically all of astrophysics. Fundamental processes from star formation to stellar winds to…
Hydrogen sulfide (H2S) is thought to be an important sulfur reservoir in interstellar ices. It serves as a key precursor to complex sulfur-bearing organics, and has been proposed to play a significant role in the origin of life. Although…
We present results of molecular dynamics simulations of the electron system on the surface of liquid helium. The simulations are done for 1600 electrons with periodic boundary conditions. Electron scattering by capillary waves and phonons…
The inner regions of protoplanetary disks are host to the sublimation of dust grains, a process traditionally modeled using equilibrium thermodynamics. We demonstrate through ab-initio density functional theory (DFT) and kinetic Monte Carlo…
Many theoretical and laboratory studies predict H2 to be formed in highly excited ro-vibrational states. The consequent relaxation of excited levels via a cascade of infrared transitions might be observable in emission from suitable…
Hydrogels hold promise in agriculture as reservoirs of water in dry soil, potentially alleviating the burden of irrigation. However, confinement in soil can markedly reduce the ability of hydrogels to absorb water and swell, limiting their…
Sublimation of drifting snow, which is significant for the balances of mass and energy of the polar ice sheet, is a complex physical process with intercoupling between ice crystals, wind field, temperature, and moisture. Here a…
Dust grains are an important component of the interstellar medium (ISM) of galaxies. We present the first direct measurement of the residence times of interstellar dust in the different ISM phases, and of the transition rates between these…