Interstellar molecules as a research area focuses on the detection, identification, and characterization of molecules in the interstellar medium (ISM), and on understanding their formation pathways, destruction processes, and astrochemical evolution. It integrates radio, millimeter, infrared, and UV spectroscopy with theoretical chemistry and reaction-kinetics modeling to constrain physical conditions in molecular clouds, diffuse clouds, and circumstellar envelopes. Research addresses gas-phase and grain-surface chemistry, isotopic fractionation, and the role of UV radiation, cosmic rays, and shocks in driving molecular complexity. This field informs models of star and planet formation, the chemical enrichment of galaxies, and the potential prebiotic inventory delivered to nascent planetary systems.
Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics (MPE), in collaboration with astrophysicists from the Centro de Astrobiología (CAB), CSIC-INTA, have identified the largest sulfur-bearing molecule ever ...
Astronomy
Jan 23, 2026
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Clues about how galaxies like our Milky Way form and evolve and why their stars show surprising chemical patterns have been revealed by a new study.
Astronomy
Dec 8, 2025
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106
Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are important carriers of organic matter throughout the universe. As organic molecules, they play a central role in interstellar chemistry and are closely related to the origin of prebiotic ...
Astronomy
Nov 25, 2025
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26
Far from Earth, in the vast expanses of space between stars, exists a treasure trove of carbon. There, in what scientists call the "interstellar medium," you can find a wide range of organic molecules—from honeycomblike ...
Astrobiology
Nov 3, 2025
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34
Could scientists find life in the clouds of exoplanet atmospheres? This is what a manuscripton the arXiv preprint server hopes to address as a team of researchers investigate how the biosignatures of microbes could be identified ...
Astrobiology
Oct 28, 2025
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An international team of astronomers has created the first-ever large-scale maps of a mysterious form of matter, known as CO-dark molecular gas, in one of our Milky Way's most active star-forming neighborhoods, Cygnus X. ...
Astronomy
Oct 23, 2025
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116
A new dataset from the Green Bank Telescope (GBT) is now publicly available, opening the door for scientists worldwide to make discoveries in one of the richest molecular clouds in our galaxy, TMC-1.
Astronomy
Oct 23, 2025
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37
Astrophysicists from Keele University, alongside an international research team supported by NASA, detected large complex organic molecules in ices outside the Milky Way for the first time—offering a glimpse into the chemistry ...
Astronomy
Oct 20, 2025
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37
Using CO (J=1–0) molecular line data obtained from the 13.7-meter millimeter-wave telescope at the Purple Mountain Observatory's Delingha Observatory, Sun Mingke, a Ph.D. student from the Xinjiang Astronomical Observatory ...
Astronomy
Oct 13, 2025
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65
The first stars in the universe formed out of pristine hydrogen and helium clouds, in the first few hundred million years after the Big Bang. New James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) observations reveal that some of the first ...
Astronomy
Oct 1, 2025
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