Hot molecule explains cold chemistry
Monday, January 30, 2012 - 07:30
in Physics & Chemistry
(PhysOrg.com) -- Surprisingly, hydrogen cyanide and its far more energetic isomer, hydrogen isocyanide, are present in almost equal amounts in cold interstellar gas clouds. Scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics have succeeded in explaining how this happens through experiments carried out in the Heidelberg ion storage ring. During interstellar synthesis hydrogen cyanide forms as a hot hybrid from which the two isomers evolve in about equal quantities.