The chemical nature of Orion protostars: Are ORANGES different from PEACHES? ORANGES II

TL;DR

This study investigates the chemical composition of 19 solar-mass protostars in Orion, finding a lower occurrence of hot corinos compared to Perseus, suggesting environmental influence on protostellar chemistry.

Contribution

It provides new insights into the chemical diversity of protostars in Orion and compares it with Perseus, highlighting potential environmental effects on star formation chemistry.

Findings

26% of Orion protostars show hot corino signatures

Hot corinos are less common in Orion than in Perseus

Environmental factors may influence protostellar chemical composition

Abstract

Understanding the chemical past of our Sun and how life appeared on Earth is no mean feat. The best strategy we can adopt is to study newborn stars located in an environment similar to the one in which our Sun was born and assess their chemical content. In particular, hot corinos are prime targets since recent studies showed correlations between interstellar Complex Organic Molecules (iCOMs) abundances from hot corinos and comets. The ORion ALMA New GEneration Survey (ORANGES) aims to assess the number of hot corinos in the closest and best analogue to our Sun's birth environment, the OMC-2/3 filament. In this context, we investigated the chemical nature of 19 solar-mass protostars and found that 26\% of our sample sources shows warm methanol emission indicative of hot corinos. Compared to the Perseus low-mass star-forming region, where the PErseus ALMA CHEmistry Survey (PEACHES) detected $\sim 60$\% of hot corinos, the latter seem to be relatively scarce in the OMC-2/3 filament. While this suggests that the chemical nature of protostars in Orion and Perseus is different, improved statistics are needed in order to consolidate this result. If the two regions are truly different, this would indicate that the environment is likely playing a role in shaping the chemical composition of protostars.