Letter to the Editor

Detection of abundant solid methanol toward young low mass stars^*

¹ Leiden Observatory, PO Box 9513, 2300 RA Leiden, The Netherlands
² Institut d'Astrophysique Spatiale, Bât. 121, CNRS UMR8617, Université Paris XI, 91405 Orsay Cedex, France
³ Astronomical Institute “Anton Pannekoek”, University of Amsterdam, Kruislaan 403, 1098 SJ Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Corresponding author: K. M. Pontoppidan, pontoppi@strw.leidenuniv.nl

Received: 2 April 2003
Accepted: 24 April 2003

Abstract

We present detections of the absorption band at  due to solid methanol toward three low-mass young stellar objects located in the Serpens and Chameleon molecular cloud complexes. The sources were observed as part of a large spectroscopic survey of ≈40 protostars. This is the first detection of solid methanol in the vicinity of low mass () young stars and shows that the formation of methanol does not depend on the proximity of massive young stars. The abundances of solid methanol compared to water ice for the three sources are in the range 15–25% which is comparable to those for the most methanol-rich massive sources known. The presence of abundant methanol in the circumstellar environment of some low mass young stars has important consequences for the formation scenarios of methanol and more complex organic species near young solar-type stars.