Giant Cloud of Methanol Found in Space

kakos writes "Astronomers have recently discovered a giant cloud of methanol in our region of the Milky Way Galaxy. The cloud measures 463 billion kilometres across. Study of this cloud could lead scientists to a greater understanding of how star formation occurs. Furthermore, the abundance of organic molecules in interstellar space could also shed light on the chemical origins of life."

Comments

Re:Oh. Methanol, not methane.

[AWeishaupt]

This is definately the most interesting part of this discovery. We know that simple organic molecules like MeOH were most likely critical steps in the biochemical origins of life on Earth, and it has been generally accepted in the past that these kinds of molecules couldn't remain stable in space, primarily due to radiolysis, whilst now it seems they can.

Re:Origins of life my foot

[FirienFirien]

Considering how tough it is to find organic molecules at all - whether organic by courtesy or not - finding a vast cloud of methanol is extraordinary. While finding methanol on earth would at best be vaguely interesting, since in the lifetime of the earth we've managed to significantly bypass the stage of small molecules, remember that if you've got 463 billion km of methanol there's a fair chance that something did it. Whether it's vapour trails from a cosmic express or some strange unforeseen product from the explosion of a star with just the right mass balance to get this kind of ratio of atoms to form the products, it's hugely interesting to find it up there.

The chances of two random atoms interacting is middling to fair. Biatoms will readily form molecules, especially since the simplest atom is hydrogen which will happily pair up with another of itself. The chances of two different molecules interacting closely enough to react is very low. On earth we need dense solutions with a heat source to get a reaction to happen. The chances of interaction to produce a cloud of particles is very low, though with the amount of stuff out there you can understand how it happens. The chance of getting reaction of enough molecules in one way to produce enough of one kind of product to show up on a spectrometer is fantastically small. Note that the article doesn't say "methane and methanol", which would be more expected from reaction with carbon in a hydrogen-rich environment; and if you mix oxygen and methane together in an attempt to get methanol, you'll get the lower-energy products of carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide and water.