Description
Titan's dense atmosphere and complex organic chemistry make it a prime candidate for investigating prebiotic processes beyond Earth. In this project, we investigate the role of Galactic Cosmic Rays and solar wind particles in processing molecular ices relevant to Titan’s atmosphere. Pure ices of phenanthrene (C₁₄H₁₀), acetonitrile (CH₃CN), and their 1:1 mixtures were deposited in situ onto a cold substrate at 20 K within the AQUILA ultra-high vacuum (UHV) chamber in Debrecen, Hungary. These samples were then irradiated with 10 keV protons to simulate energetic particle bombardment under space-like conditions.
Infrared (IR) spectroscopy was used to monitor the spectral evolution of each ice sample. Band peak positions and integrated areas were analyzed to determine ice thickness and molecular column density. The IR spectra across different proton fluences revealed a consistent decrease in the intensity of characteristic bands for both molecules. Notably, new bands emerged only in acetonitrile ice, suggesting the possible formation of amino acetonitrile. In contrast, no new products were observed in phenanthrene ice. Interestingly, the behavior of the 1:1 phenanthrene–acetonitrile mixture indicates that phenanthrene may protect acetonitrile from energetic processing, thereby suppressing the formation of new species.
These findings suggest that hydrocarbons behave differently under astrophysical irradiation conditions. Further detailed analysis of the pure ices is ongoing to better understand the reasons for their behaviors.
This work was also supported by Europlanet 2024 RI which has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research Innovation Programme under Grant Agreement No. 871149.
| Talk category | NOVA Network 2 |
|---|---|
| Preference for a talk or poster | Poster |
