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- Title
Hydrogen Cyanide Production due to Mid-Size Impacts in a Redox-Neutral N-Rich Atmosphere.
- Authors
Kurosawa, Kosuke; Sugita, Seiji; Ishibashi, Ko; Hasegawa, Sunao; Sekine, Yasuhito; Ogawa, Nanako; Kadono, Toshihiko; Ohno, Sohsuke; Ohkouchi, Naohiko; Nagaoka, Yoichi; Matsui, Takafumi
- Abstract
Cyanide compounds are amongst the most important molecules of the origin of life. Here, we demonstrate the importance of mid-size (0.1-1 km in diameter) hence frequent meteoritic impacts to the cyanide inventory on the early Earth. Subsequent aerodynamic ablation and chemical reactions with the ambient atmosphere after oblique impacts were investigated by both impact and laser experiments. A polycarbonate projectile and graphite were used as laboratory analogs of meteoritic organic matter. Spectroscopic observations of impact-generated ablation vapors show that laser irradiation to graphite within an N-rich gas can produce a thermodynamic environment similar to that produced by oblique impacts. Thus, laser ablation was used to investigate the final chemical products after this aerodynamic process. We found that a significant fraction (>0.1 mol%) of the vaporized carbon is converted to HCN and cyanide condensates, even when the ambient gas contains as much as a few hundred mbar of CO. As such, the column density of cyanides after carbon-rich meteoritic impacts with diameters of 600 m would reach ~10 mol/m over ~10 km under early Earth conditions. Such a temporally and spatially concentrated supply of cyanides may have played an important role in the origin of life.
- Subjects
HYDROCYANIC acid; NITROGEN; OXIDATION-reduction reaction; POLYCARBONATES; HYPERVELOCITY; ABLATION (Aerothermodynamics); MASS spectrometry
- Publication
Origins of Life & Evolution of the Biosphere, 2013, Vol 43, Issue 3, p221
- ISSN
0169-6149
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1007/s11084-013-9339-0