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1Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitches2Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problems3Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minuteFormylphosphine (HCOPH₂) was made and detected in a laboratory experiment designed to simulate part of the chemistry of cold interstellar ice. It was not detected in outer space: the researchers irradiated a frozen carbon monoxide–phosphine mixture with energetic electrons, then identified the product in gas released from the ice.
What “space-like conditions” means in this experiment
Frigge and colleagues used an ultrahigh-vacuum surface-science apparatus to study radiation chemistry in a cold ice analogue. The apparatus had a reported base pressure of a few 10⁻¹¹ Torr. The binary carbon monoxide (CO) and phosphine (PH₃) ice samples were prepared at 5.5 ± 0.2 K, with a thickness of 700 ± 100 nm and a mixture ratio of 1:2 ± 0.5.
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Those are laboratory settings chosen to represent selected features of interstellar ice—not measurements of conditions on actual interstellar dust grains. Energetic electrons served as proxies for secondary electrons produced when galactic cosmic rays pass through ice. The experiment therefore tested whether radiation could drive the proposed chemistry in a controlled analogue; it did not recreate an entire interstellar environment.
How the team made and identified HCOPH₂
From irradiated ice to gas-phase detection
The researchers exposed the frozen CO–PH₃ mixtures to ionizing radiation and detected HCOPH₂ in the gas phase using isomer-selective photoionization reflectron time-of-flight mass spectrometry (PI-ReTOF-MS). Electronic-structure calculations supported the product assignment. Experiments using isotopically labelled carbon monoxide, including ¹³CO and C¹⁸O, were also used to test the assignments.
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As the authors of the 2018 Chemical Communications paper put it, “The formylphosphine (HCOPH₂) molecule was detected in the gas phase via isomer selective photoionization reflectron time-of-flight mass spectrometry (PI-ReTOF-MS).” This describes a laboratory detection after irradiation, not a telescope observation.
The proposed reaction sequence
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Radiation breaks a P–H bond in phosphine (PH₃), producing a PH₂ radical and an atomic hydrogen.
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An energetic hydrogen atom adds to carbon monoxide (CO), forming the HCO radical.
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PH₂ and HCO recombine to produce formylphosphine, HCOPH₂.
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The study reports average radiation doses of 0.8 ± 0.2 eV per molecule for phosphine and 0.6 ± 0.1 eV per molecule for carbon monoxide. Its interstellar-ice estimate gives an upper HCOPH₂ yield of 0.02 molecules eV⁻¹. That figure is a yield estimated by the authors from their experiment, not a measured abundance of formylphosphine in space.
Why a phosphorus analogue of formamide matters
HCOPH₂ is an isovalent phosphorus analogue of formamide (HCONH₂), a well-known interstellar molecule. The authors describe formylphosphine as the simplest molecule carrying a phosphorus peptide moiety (–CO–PH–). This makes it relevant to questions about how phosphorus-bearing compounds might participate in carbonyl chemistry.
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That chemical resemblance does not make HCOPH₂ a biological peptide, nor does its laboratory formation establish a connection to life. The broader proposal is that, if the molecule forms in interstellar environments and is eventually observed there, it could help researchers investigate possible links between simpler phosphorus reservoirs and more complex phosphorus-bearing molecules. That remains a hypothesis, not an established astronomical pathway.
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Has formylphosphine been found in space?
The cited laboratory study proposed that formylphosphine may be detectable in space; the sources reviewed here do not establish an astronomical detection. A laboratory mass-spectrometry result and a prediction that a molecule may be detectable are not evidence that a telescope has observed it.
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For context, Lucy M. Ziurys’s 2024 review says that more than 200 gas-phase chemical compounds have been discovered in interstellar space and names PO and PN among phosphorus-bearing species found in molecular clouds. Ziurys writes: “Elusive phosphorus has now been found in molecular clouds, the sites of star formation, in the molecules PO and PN.” This is context for phosphorus chemistry, not a claim that HCOPH₂ has been detected. A catalogue-table entry by itself would likewise not verify an astronomical observation.
What the result establishes—and what it does not
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Established in the reported experiment: irradiation of cold CO–PH₃ ice analogues produced gas-phase HCOPH₂ that the team identified using PI-ReTOF-MS, with calculations and labelled-CO experiments supporting the assignment.
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Proposed by the authors: a reaction route involving PH₂ and HCO radicals, and potential formation and detectability in interstellar environments.
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Not established by this result: the presence or abundance of HCOPH₂ in space, or a confirmed role for it in prebiotic chemistry.
The primary study is Robert Frigge et al., “Synthesis of the hitherto elusive formylphosphine (HCOPH₂) in the interstellar medium,” Chemical Communications 54(72), 10152–10155 (2018), doi:10.1039/C8CC04125C.
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