Detection of complex organic molecules in a prestellar core: a new challenge for astrochemical models

Abstract

Context. Complex organic molecules (COMs) have long been detected in the interstellar medium, especially in hot cores and in the hot corinos of low-mass protostars. Their formation routes however remain uncertain. Both warm gas-phase reactions and warm grain-surface reactions have been invoked to account for their presence in low-mass protostars. In this latter scheme, COMs result from radical-radical reactions on the grains as radicals become mobile when the nascent protostar warms up its surroundings and the resulting molecules are subsequently desorbed into the gas phase at higher temperatures.