Can studying the molecules surrounding a very old and dying star unlock information about the chemical story of life's origins?

Bob Glinski's career is grounded in chemistry, but his eye tends to wander to the sky when objects such as the Red Rectangle present mysteries to solve. Although Pluto has captured the press' attention lately, the Red Rectangle, an unusual nebula that appears as a glowing red X-shaped structure through NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, presents a current challenge to many researchers around the globe.

	The Red Rectangle Credit: Hubble Space Telescope

Pursuing his passion for astrochemistry, the Chemistry Professor, along with senior Chemistry major Phil Michaels, is studying the molecules that emit light of their own from along the X-shaped bars of the Red Rectangle. According to Glinski, these molecules are in a unique place in space, and only a few have been identified.

"There's a binary star system at the center of a disc of gas and dust.” he explains. "Imagine the disk as a CD viewed edge-on with the stars in the center. The stars are relatively small dots, totally obscured by the disk; but the starlight excites molecules to emit light along the X-shape as seen. The spectrum of the light from the molecules, in many cases, has not been identified in any lab on Earth.

"My work may seem arcane, but these molecules that light up in space are fun to study because you can measure the different characteristics of the different wavelengths of light and try to identify a molecule specifically," says Glinski. "There aren't too many molecules you can identify in space from their light emission in visible wavelengths."

What Glinski describes is called a molecule's "spectroscopic signature," and researchers have found some signatures they have not been able to link to specific molecules. It is not clear even which molecules create the striking red color of the rectangle.

Glinski is studying a very narrow set of colors in the light spectrum to help him learn about the material that has remained unidentified for more than 25 years.

Glinski's interest stems from his study of comets, which are very young in comparison to the old, dying star of the Red Rectangle. Some molecules identified in comets are complex, organic molecules, suggesting some life molecules on Earth came from comets. He suspects similar complex and even unusual molecules are to be found around the Red Rectangle.

"This is a rare chance to study these molecules because they don't last in the harsh environment of space, but in the space near the star they are sequestered in and around the disc, and we can see them at the interface between what was in the dark and what is coming into the sunlight," says Glinski.

The Red Rectangle was first discovered in the 1970s, but the Hubble telescope revealed new features in the past few years that cannot be seen with ground-based telescopes. A study in the 2004 issue of The Astronomical Journal revealed that the rectangle is actually an X-shaped structure with gas and dust outflows shooting in opposite directions. The shape is described as "two ice-cream cones touching at their tips."

Glinski is one of a small number of chemists in the world who delve into the growing field of astrochemistry and put their work alongside astronomers. He says astronomers have begun to appreciate and show interest in the work. In fact, based on his scholarly publications on comets, Glinski was nominated and elected a member of the International Astronomical Union, the organization at the forefront of the debate over Pluto's status as a planet.

In collaboration with Chris Anderson, a professor of astronomy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Glinski employs the world-class WIYN telescope located on Arizona's Kitt Peak.