In 1919 Mary Lea Heger demonstrated that certain diffuse absorptions in reddened spectra were of interstellar origin. Many hundreds are now known. In 1988 Harry Kroto suggested soccer-ball carbon configurations – fullerenes – might well be the source. In 1994 Bernard Foing & Pascale Ehrenfreund predicted and found two diffuse interstellar bands near 1 μm caused by the Fullerene ion C60+ but these could not be confirmed in the lab. In 2016 John Maier and Ewen Campbell in Basel succeeded in producing credible lab profiles and found additional bands. David Bohlender and I detected the five strongest with ESPaDONs at CFHT and with GRACES. Both the lab and telescope detections presented major challenges, particularly from skeptics.
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2020-04-20T15:00:002020-04-20T16:00:00Do Fullerenes solve the 100 year old Diffuse Interstellar Band mystery?Event Information:
In 1919 Mary Lea Heger demonstrated that certain diffuse absorptions in reddened spectra were of interstellar origin. Many hundreds are now known. In 1988 Harry Kroto suggested soccer-ball carbon configurations – fullerenes – might well be the source. In 1994 Bernard Foing & Pascale Ehrenfreund predicted and found two diffuse interstellar bands near 1 μm caused by the Fullerene ion C60+ but these could not be confirmed in the lab. In 2016 John Maier and Ewen Campbell in Basel succeeded in producing credible lab profiles and found additional bands. David Bohlender and I detected the five strongest with ESPaDONs at CFHT and with GRACES. Both the lab and telescope detections presented major challenges, particularly from skeptics.Event Location:
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