The TW Hya Rosetta Stone Project. II. Spatially Resolved Emission of Formaldehyde Hints at Low-temperature Gas-phase Formation
- Terwisscha van Scheltinga, J
- Hogerheijde, MR
- Cleeves, LI
- Loomis, RA
- Walsh, C
- Öberg, KI
- Bergin, EA
- Bergner, JB
- Blake, GA
- Calahan, JK
- Cazzoletti, P
- van Dishoeck, EF
- Guzmán, VV
- Huang, J
- Kama, M
- Qi, C
- Teague, R
- Wilner, DJ
DOIAbstract
Formaldehyde (H2CO) is an important precursor to organics like methanol (CH3OH). It is important to understand the conditions that produce H2CO and prebiotic molecules during star and planet formation. H2CO possesses both gas-phase and solid-state formation pathways, involving either UV-produced radical precursors or CO ice and cold (≲20 K) dust grains. To understand which pathway dominates, gaseous H2CO's ortho-to-para ratio (OPR) has been used as a probe, with a value of 3 indicating "warm" conditions and <3 linked to cold formation in the solid state. We present spatially resolved Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array observations of multiple ortho- and para-H2CO transitions in the TW Hya protoplanetary disk to test H2CO formation...
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