Rotational Spectroscopy And Tentative Interstellar Detection of 3-Hydroxypropanal (HOCH2CH2CHO)in the G+0.693-0.027 Molecular Cloud
We synthesized the astrochemically relevant molecule 3-hydroxypropanal (HOCH2CH2CHO) 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)×1012 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.
Zachary T.P. Fried, Roman A. Motiyenko, Miguel Sanz-Novo, Lucie Kolesniková, Jean-Claude Guillemin, Laurent Margulès, Tereza Uhlíková, Arnaud Belloche, Jes K. Jørgensen, Martin S. Holdren, Ci Xue, Štěpán Urban, Izaskun Jiménez-Serra, Victor M. Rivilla, Brett A. McGuire
Comments: Accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal
Subjects: Astrophysics of Galaxies (astro-ph.GA)
Cite as: arXiv:2508.15911 [astro-ph.GA](or arXiv:2508.15911v1 [astro-ph.GA] for this version)
https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2508.15911
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Submission history
From: Zachary Fried
[v1] Thu, 21 Aug 2025 18:12:03 UTC (4,795 KB)
https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.15911
Astrobiology, Astrochemistry,
