Tholine

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Formation of tholins in Titan's upper atmosphere

Tholine (derived from the Greek word for muddy) describes a reddish-brown mixture of complex organic molecules made of carbon , nitrogen and hydrogen , which form in the atmosphere of gas planets, moons or comets under the influence of UV radiation and the solar wind .

Based on spectral analyzes of foreign celestial bodies , one suspects a composition as heteropolymer or macromolecules , which is formed from simple organic substances such as methane or ethane and nitrogen. The substance is reddish-brown in color.

They could also have been present on early Earth and played an important role in the origin of life.

The astronomer Carl Sagan discovered a substance in the atmosphere of Saturn's moon Titan , which he described as a reddish organic component of planetary surfaces. Tholin was later also detected on comet , but not on Earth . On Pluto , too , scientists believe Tholine to be the reason for the dwarf planet's predominantly red-brown color .

Outside the solar system , the substance was first detected in 2007 in the dust disk around the star HR 4796A (220 light years from Earth).

Individual evidence

  1. a b c Sylvia Feil, Jörg Resag, Kristin Riebe: Fascinating Chemistry A journey of discovery from the origin of the elements to modern chemistry . Springer-Verlag, 2016, ISBN 3-662-49920-7 , pp. 112 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  2. S. Derenne, C. Coelho, C. Anquetil, C. Szopa, AS Rahman, PF McMillan, F. Corà, CJ Pickard, E. Quirico, C. Bonhomme: New insights into the structure and chemistry of Titan's tholins via 13C and 15N solid state nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. In: Icarus. 221, 2012, p. 844, doi: 10.1016 / j.icarus.2012.03.003 .
  3. Norbert Welsch, Jürgen Schwab, Claus Liebmann: Materie earth, water, air and fire . Springer-Verlag, 2013, ISBN 978-3-8274-2265-1 , pp. 463 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  4. Carl Sagan, BN Khare: Tholins: organic chemistry of interstellar grains and gas. In: Nature. 277, 1979, p. 102, doi: 10.1038 / 277102a0 .
  5. Kevin W. Plaxco, Michael Gross: Astrobiology for beginners . John Wiley & Sons, 2013, ISBN 3-527-66764-4 ( limited preview in Google Book Search).
  6. ^ Lillian Gipson: New Horizons Finds Blue Skies and Water Ice on Pluto. NASA, October 8, 2015, accessed on May 26, 2018 (English, German revision at scinexx.de ).
  7. " Original planetary material could already contain building blocks for life" , Spiegel Online , January 5, 2008.
  8. "Starter Kit for Life". In: Wissenschaft.de. January 7, 2008, accessed September 8, 2019 .