The HDO/H2O ratio is a powerful diagnostic to understand the evolution of water from the first stages of star formation to the formation of planets and comets. Our aim is to determine precisely the abundance distribution of HDO towards the low-mass p
rotostar IRAS16293-2422 and learn more about the water formation mechanisms by determining the HDO/H2O abundance ratio. A spectral survey of the source IRAS16293-2422 was carried out in the framework of the CHESS Herschel Key program with the HIFI instrument, allowing the detection of numerous HDO lines. Other transitions have been observed previously with ground-based telescopes. The spherical Monte Carlo radiative transfer code RATRAN was used to reproduce the observed line profiles of HDO by assuming an abundance jump. To determine the H2O abundance throughout the envelope, a similar study was made of the H2-18O observed lines, as the H2O main isotope lines are contaminated by the outflows. We derive an inner HDO abundance of 1.7e-7 and an outer HDO abundance of 8e-11. To reproduce the HDO absorption lines, it is necessary to add an absorbing layer in front of the envelope. It may correspond to a water-rich layer created by the photodesorption of the ices at the edges of the molecular cloud. The HDO/H2O ratio is ~1.4-5.8% in the hot corino whereas it is ~0.2-2.2% in the outer envelope. It is estimated at ~4.8% in the added absorbing layer. Although it is clearly higher than the cosmic D/H abundance, the HDO/H2O ratio remains lower than the D/H ratio derived for other deuterated molecules observed in the same source. The similarity of the ratios derived in the hot corino and in the added absorbing layer suggests that water formed before the gravitational collapse of the protostar, contrary to formaldehyde and methanol, which formed later once the CO molecules had depleted on the grains.
Context. The high degree of deuteration observed in some prestellar cores depends on the ortho-to-para H2 ratio through the H3+ fractionation. Aims. We want to constrain the ortho/para H2 ratio across the L183 prestellar core. This is mandatory to co
rrectly describe the deuter- ation amplification phenomenon in depleted cores such as L183 and to relate the total (ortho+para) H2D+ abundance to the sole ortho-H2D+ column density measurement. Methods. To constrain this ortho/para H2 ratio and derive its profile, we make use of the N2D+ /N2H+ ratio and of the ortho-H2D+ observations performed across the prestellar core. We use two simple chemical models limited to an almost totally depleted core description. New dissociative recombination and trihydrogen cation-dihydrogen reaction rates (including all isotopologues) are presented in this paper and included in our models. Results. We estimate the H2D+ ortho/para ratio in the L183 cloud, and constrain the H2 ortho/para ratio : we show that it is varying across the prestellar core by at least an order of magnitude being still very high (~0.1) in most of the cloud. Our time-dependent model indicates that the prestellar core is presumably older than 1.5-2 x 10^5 years but that it may not be much older. We also show that it has reached its present density only recently and that its contraction from a uniform density cloud can be constrained. Conclusions. A proper understanding of deuteration chemistry cannot be attained without taking into account the whole ortho/para family of molecular hydrogen and trihydrogen cation isotopologues as their relations are of utmost importance in the global scheme. Tracing the ortho/para H2 ratio should also give useful constraints on the dynamical evolution of prestellar cores.
We present a survey of the ortho-H2D+(1_{1,0}-1_{1,1}) line toward a sample of 10 starless cores and 6 protostellar cores, carried out at the Caltech Submillimeter Observatory. The high diagnostic power of this line is revealed for the study of the c
hemistry, and the evolutionary and dynamical status of low-mass dense cores. The line is detected in 7 starless cores and in 4 protostellar cores. N(ortho-H2D+) ranges between 2 and 40x10^{12} cm^{-2} in starless cores and between 2 and 9x10^{12} cm^{-2} in protostellar cores. The brightest lines are detected toward the densest and most centrally concentrated starless cores, where the CO depletion factor and the deuterium fractionation are also largest. The large scatter observed in plots of N(ortho-H2D+) vs. the observed deuterium fractionation and vs. the CO depletion factor is likely to be due to variations in the ortho-to-para (o/p) ratio of H2D+ from >0.5 for T_{kin} < 10 K gas in pre-stellar cores to ~0.03 (consistent with T_{kin} ~15 K for protostellar cores). The two Ophiuchus cores in our sample also require a relatively low o/p ratio (~0.3). Other parameters, including the cosmic-ray ionization rate, the CO depletion factor (or, more in general, the depletion factor of neutral species), the volume density, the fraction of dust grains and PAHs also largely affect the ortho-H2D+ abundance. The most deuterated and H2D+-rich objects (L429, L1544, L694-2 and L183) are reproduced by chemical models of centrally concentrated (central densties ~10^{6} cm^{-3}) cores with chemical ages between 10^4 and 10^6 yr. Upper limits of the para-H3O+ (1_1- -2_1+) and para-D2H+ (1_{1,0}-1_{0,1}) lines are also given. (Abridged)
