Non-traditional pathways of solid-phase astrochemical reactions

Abstract

There are considered mechanisms of solid-phase reactions which were investigated experimentally and theoretically during recent decades and can have direct connections to the formation of organic substances in space and their delivery to the Earth, to the problems of prebiotic evolution. Among such mechanisms are the molecular tunneling (hypothesis of the cold prehistory of life), polycondensation of solid monomers by shock waves (problem of the delivery of organic substances to the Earth by meteorites), thermal and thermal-wave explosions and oscillations of temperature and radical concentrations in small cold particles under the radiation exposure, mechanochemical explosions and autowave propagation of chemical reactions due to the positive feedback between fragile destruction of solids and reactions at freshly formed surfaces.