Beyer lab - Spec­troscopy and reac­tiv­ity of metal com­plexes in astro­chem­istry

Despite decades of research, the chemistry of iron in interstellar clouds holds more questions than answers. In the mass spectrometer, we can simulate the vacuum conditions found in space. We vaporize iron with a short laser pulse and mix the iron vapour with gas in the ion source to produce charged, reactive iron compounds similar to those in space. We inject these into the mass spectrometer and examine them further with lasers and other reaction partners. This provides us with data that can be compared with astronomical observations to ideally identify iron complexes in interstellar clouds.