Chemical Demographics of Star-forming Regions

@misc{drozdovskaya2026chemical,
  title = {{Chemical Demographics of Star-forming Regions}},
  author = {Maria N. Drozdovskaya and Timea Csengeri and Maria Teresa Beltrán and Jes Jørgensen and Alain Baudry and Henrik Beuther and Laure Bouscasse and Laura Colzi and Audrey Coutens and Marta De Simone and Pamela Klaassen and Maryvonne Gerin and Adam Ginsburg and Daniel Harsono and Katharine Johnston and Xing Lu and Sébastien Maret and Sergio Martín and Aina Palau and Giovanni Sabatini and Miguel Sanz-Novo and Maxime Tanious and Claudia Toci and Yao-Lun Yang and Shaoshan Zeng and Korash Assani and Aurore Bacmann and Eleonora Bianchi and Gary Fuller and Izaskun Jiménez-Serra and Ágnes Kóspál and Michael Küffmeier and Álvaro Sánchez-Monge and Frédérique Motte and Mamta Pandey-Pommier and Dries Van De Putte and Víctor Rivilla and Łukasz Tychoniec},
  howpublished = {arXiv},
  year = {2026},
  month = oct,
  doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2610.22303},
  eprint = {2610.22303},
  archivePrefix = {arXiv},
  url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.22303},
  note = {CC BY 4.0},
}

TY  - UNPB
TI  - Chemical Demographics of Star-forming Regions
AU  - Maria N. Drozdovskaya
AU  - Timea Csengeri
AU  - Maria Teresa Beltrán
AU  - Jes Jørgensen
AU  - Alain Baudry
AU  - Henrik Beuther
AU  - Laure Bouscasse
AU  - Laura Colzi
AU  - Audrey Coutens
AU  - Marta De Simone
AU  - Pamela Klaassen
AU  - Maryvonne Gerin
AU  - Adam Ginsburg
AU  - Daniel Harsono
AU  - Katharine Johnston
AU  - Xing Lu
AU  - Sébastien Maret
AU  - Sergio Martín
AU  - Aina Palau
AU  - Giovanni Sabatini
AU  - Miguel Sanz-Novo
AU  - Maxime Tanious
AU  - Claudia Toci
AU  - Yao-Lun Yang
AU  - Shaoshan Zeng
AU  - Korash Assani
AU  - Aurore Bacmann
AU  - Eleonora Bianchi
AU  - Gary Fuller
AU  - Izaskun Jiménez-Serra
AU  - Ágnes Kóspál
AU  - Michael Küffmeier
AU  - Álvaro Sánchez-Monge
AU  - Frédérique Motte
AU  - Mamta Pandey-Pommier
AU  - Dries Van De Putte
AU  - Víctor Rivilla
AU  - Łukasz Tychoniec
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/10/16
PB  - arXiv
DO  - 10.48550/arxiv.2610.22303
UR  - https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.22303
AB  - Our understanding of complex organic chemistry during the formation of stars and planets is shaped by a handful of cherry-picked sources with bright molecular emission lines. This observational bias impedes our assessment of how universal chemical complexity is during star formation. The lack of systematic wideband spectral surveys for statistically significant samples of protostars and cores is a major roadblock to properly probing how COM inventories and abundances depend on the vast range of physical conditions, local cloud and global galactic environments, and evolutionary timescales of low- and high-mass star formation. In turn, this limits our ability to constrain and test physicochemical models, which depend critically on these parameters. The next-generation ALMA2040, with a 10x improvement in line sensitivity, is required to observe COMs, that we perceive as common today, in a fraction of the observing time that is needed today with ALMA. Such capabilities will propel us into the era of chemical demographics, whereby wideband (>100 GHz) spectral surveys at high sensitivity (routinely probing COM abundances down to 0.01% relative to CH3OH) will be executed towards >1000-10000 prestellar and protostellar sources. With robust chemical inventories towards large source sample sizes, we will be able to probe for dependencies of chemical complexity on mass regime, feedback processes in a cluster, Galactic position, metallicity, and time-variable accretion. Only with statistically significant samples at high sensitivity will we be able to assess the ubiquity and homogeneity of COM chemistry across the protostellar mass spectrum and natal cores. Constraining the diversity and availability of such species is critical for our understanding of the chemical reservoir available for planet formation, which eventually shapes (exo)planetary atmosphere compositions.
ER  -