Professor Dr Ewine van Dishoeck

Research Priorities: Astrochemistry, interstellar molecules, the formation of stars and planets, submillimetre and infrared astronomy, laboratory astrophysics
Ewine van Dishoeck is a Dutch chemist and astronomer. Her pioneering research into the chemical composition of the universe has deepened the understanding of how stars and planets are formed.
The space between stars and planets is not empty, but filled with very thin, cold gas clouds. In addition to hydrogen and carbon monoxide, these clouds consist of a number of exotic compounds and organic molecules. Ewine van Dishoeck researches what chemical processes occur when gas clouds collide in order to form stars, and the predominant conditions in the dust rings surrounding young stars in which planets may form. The molecules also function as sensors for temperature and pressure, allowing Ewine van Dishoeck to precisely examine the conditions of the material in space.
She uses instruments such as the Very Large Telescope (VLT) of the European Southern Observatory in Chile, and the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA), also in Chile, as well as the Herschel Space Observatory. These receive electromagnetic signals from space, which, like all electromagnetic waves, are emitted directly by molecules. Recently, she has examined the organic and water molecules involved in these processes in order to investigate how water and life might originate on planets.
The methods that Ewine van Dishoeck and her colleagues have developed to analyse cosmochemistry have become standard procedures in this still young discipline. She also makes use of quantum chemical techniques. She uses these techniques to define processes that occur in space under extreme conditions involving low temperatures and low pressure, and which are very difficult to reproduce in experiments here on Earth under laboratory conditions.