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A search for organic molecules in intermediate redshift DLAs

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 October 2005

Brandon Lawton ,
Brian York ,
Sara L. Ellison ,
Christopher W. Churchill ,
Rachel A. Johnson  and
Theodore P. Snow
Brandon Lawton
Affiliation:
Department of Astronomy, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, NM 88003, USA email: blawton@nmsu.edu, cwc@nmsu.edu
Brian York
Affiliation:
Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Victoria, Victoria, BC, V8W 3P6, Canada email: briany@uvic.ca, sarae@uvic.ca
Sara L. Ellison
Affiliation:
Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Victoria, Victoria, BC, V8W 3P6, Canada email: briany@uvic.ca, sarae@uvic.ca
Christopher W. Churchill
Affiliation:
Department of Astronomy, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, NM 88003, USA email: blawton@nmsu.edu, cwc@nmsu.edu
Rachel A. Johnson
Affiliation:
Department of Astrophysics, Oxford University, Oxford, OX1 3RH, UK email: raj@astro.ox.ac.uk
Theodore P. Snow
Affiliation:
Center for Astrophysics and Space Astronomy, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO 80309, USA email: Theodore.Snow@Colorado.EDU
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Abstract

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There has been a renewed interest in searching for diffuse interstellar bands (DIBs) due to their probable connection to organic molecules and, thus, their possible link to life in the Universe. Our group is undertaking an extensive search for DIBs in DLAs via QSO absorption-line systems. Six of our DLA targets are presented here. Our equivalent width (EW) limits for the $\lambda$5780 DIB line strongly suggest that DIB abundance is below the Milky Way expected value or that metallicity plays a large role in DIB strengths.