A team of astronomers from Leiden University and the National Radio Astronomy Observatory has confirmed the first robust detection of semi-heavy water ice surrounding a young sunlike star, strengthening the hypothesis that some of the solar system's water predates the Sun itself. Their study, based on observations from the James Webb Space Telescope, was published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.
The researchers focused on the deuteration ratio-the abundance of water molecules where one hydrogen is replaced by deuterium, forming HDO, or semi-heavy water. High deuteration indicates formation in extremely cold environments, such as the primordial clouds of gas and dust where stars originate.
While Earth's oceans, icy moons, and comets exhibit higher HDO levels than the Sun, this discovery of abundant semi-heavy water ice in a protostellar envelope offers direct evidence of its interstellar origins. The findings suggest that much of this water existed long before the solar system began to take shape.
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