Astronomical Detection of the Interstellar Anion C<sub>10</sub>H<sup>−</sup> toward TMC-1 from the GOTHAM Large Program on the Green Bank Telescope
Anthony J. Remijan, Haley N. Scolati, Andrew M. Burkhardt, P. Bryan Changala, Steven B. Charnley, Ilsa R. Cooke, Martin Cordiner, H. M. Sen Gupta, Eric Herbst, Kin Long Kelvin Lee, Ryan A. Loomis, Christopher N. Shingledecker, Mark A. Siebert, Ci Xue, Michael McCarthy, Brett A. McGuire
Abstract
Abstract Using data from the Green Bank Telescope (GBT) Observations of TMC-1: Hunting for Aromatic Molecules (GOTHAM) survey, we report the first astronomical detection of the C 10 H − anion. The astronomical observations also provided the necessary data to refine the spectroscopic parameters of C 10 H − . From the velocity stacked data and the matched filter response, C 10 H − is detected at >9 σ confidence level at a column density of <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" overflow="scroll"> <mml:msubsup> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>4.04</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>−</mml:mo> <mml:mn>2.23</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>+</mml:mo> <mml:mn>10.67</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msubsup> <mml:mo>×</mml:mo> <mml:msup> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>10</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>11</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msup> </mml:math> cm −2 . A dedicated search for the C 10 H radical was also conducted toward TMC-1. In this case, the stacked molecular emission of C 10 H was detected at a ∼3.2 σ confidence interval at a column density of <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" overflow="scroll"> <mml:msubsup> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>2.02</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>−</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.82</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>+</mml:mo> <mml:mn>2.68</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msubsup> <mml:mo>×</mml:mo> <mml:msup> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>10</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>11</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msup> </mml:math> cm −2 . However, as the determined confidence level is currently <5 σ , we consider the identification of C 10 H as tentative. The full GOTHAM data set was also used to better characterize the physical parameters including column density, excitation temperature, line width, and source size for the C 4 H, C 6 H, and C 8 H radicals and their respective anions, and the measured column densities were compared to the predictions from a gas/grain chemical formation model and from a machine learning analysis. Given the measured values, the C 10 H − /C 10 H column density ratio is ∼ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" overflow="scroll"> <mml:msubsup> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>2.0</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>−</mml:mo> <mml:mn>1.6</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>+</mml:mo> <mml:mn>5.9</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msubsup> </mml:math> —the highest value measured between an anion and neutral species to date. Such a high ratio is at odds with current theories for interstellar anion chemistry. For the radical species, both models can reproduce the measured abundances found from the survey; however, the machine learning analysis matches the detected anion abundances much better than the gas/grain chemical model, suggesting that the current understanding of the formation chemistry of molecular anions is still highly uncertain.