Low temperature spectroscopy and irradiation effects on Solar System ices--Kuiper belt objects as a case study.

  title={Low temperature spectroscopy and irradiation effects on Solar System ices--Kuiper belt objects as a case study.},
  author={R. Kaiser and Weijun Zheng and Y. Osamura and A. Chang},
  journal={Physical chemistry chemical physics : PCCP},
  volume={13 35},
Since their discovery in 1992, Kuiper Belt Objects (KBOs)—small planetary bodies beyond the orbit of Neptune and ‘precursors’ to short periodic comets— have received considerable attention from the planetary sciences, astronomy, and physical chemistry community. At the low temperatures of KBOs of 30–50 K, a chemical modification of their surface ices such as water, nitrogen, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, methanol, and possibly ammonia is predominantly induced via non-equilibrium chemistry… Expand


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