Rotational Spectroscopy and Tentative Interstellar Detection of 3-hydroxypropanal (HOCH<sub>2</sub>CH<sub>2</sub>CHO) in the G+0.693-0.027 Molecular Cloud
Abstract We synthesized the astrochemically relevant molecule 3-hydroxypropanal (HOCH 2 CH 2 CHO) and subsequently measured and analyzed its rotational spectrum in several frequency regions ranging from 130 to 485 GHz. We analyzed the ground vibrational state as well as the two perturbed lowest-lying vibrationally excited states. With the resulting rotational parameters, we searched for this molecule in the Sagittarius B2(N) and NGC 6334I hot cores, the IRAS 16293-2422B hot corino, and the G+0.693-0.027 and TMC-1 molecular clouds. Rotational emission of 3-hydroxypropanal was tentatively detected toward G+0.693-0.027, and a column density of (8.6 ±1.4) × 10 12 cm −2 was determined. However, this molecule was not detected in the other sources that were investigated. The chemical implications of this tentative discovery are analyzed, and several potential chemical formation pathways of this species are discussed.
Authors
- Štěpán Urban (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4566-4930)
- Tereza Uhlíková (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6220-2092)
- R. A. Motiyenko (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3849-1533)
- Zachary T. P. Fried (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5020-5774)
- Brett A. McGuire (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1254-4817)
- V. M. Rivilla (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2887-5859)
- Lucie Kolesníková (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3567-0349)
- Ci Xue (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2760-2119)
- Miguel Sanz‐Novo (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9629-0257)
- Jean‐Claude Guillemin (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2929-057X)
- Martin Holdren (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0008-1171-278X)
- А. Беллоче (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0046-6217)
- Izaskun Jiménez-Serra (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4493-8714)
- L. Margulès (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0629-8277)
- Jes Kristian Jørgensen (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9133-8047)
Institutions
- University of Copenhagen (DK)
- Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR)
- Université de Lille (FR)
- National Radio Astronomy Observatory (US)
- Natural History Museum Aarhus (DK)
- IIT@MIT (US)
- École Nationale Supérieure de Chimie de Rennes (FR)
- Centro de Astrobiología (ES)
- Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy (DE)
- Laboratoire de Physique des Lasers, Atomes et Molécules (FR)
- Université de Rennes (FR)
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology (US)
- University of Chemistry and Technology, Prague (CZ)
Publication Details
- Journal
- The Astrophysical Journal
- Published
- 2025-10-14
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/adfc62
- Citations
- 4
- Primary Topic
- Molecular Spectroscopy and Structure
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 3.03