Young Speakers Contest

In the Young Speakers' Contest, PhD's from the Applied Physics department of the Eindhoven University of Technology can present their research in a captivating setting of a Symposium. The challenge lies in presenting your research in a way that is accessible Topic: Bringing astrochemistry to our laboratory Astrochemistry is dominated by hydrogen, which makes up 92.1% of all atoms. In 1996 the triatomic hydrogen ion H3+ was discovered in interstellar space. Since then it has become clear that H3+ plays the central role in interstellar chemistry. It converts relative inactive neutrals such as O, N2 and CO2 to highly chemically active species. Thereby it is the initiator of a chain of chemical reactions, producing molecules essential for life, like for example H2O. H3+ is created from H2+ ions, which are created by ionization of H2 by cosmic rays and highly energetic photons in the Extreme Ultraviolet (EUV) and X-ray wavelength range. Until recently, the photionization processes in space could only be studied with telescopes and using numerical simulations. With the development of next-generation lithography tools, using EUV radiation, EUV sources have become available. This allows us to study direct photoinduced plasmas in our laboratory. In our research we measure the composition of these plasmas. We have shown that H3+ becomes the most dominant ion in a hydrogen environment. Adding small amounts of other gasses creates a very rich chemistry, as is the case in many stellar clouds.