Carbon compounds form the foundations of all known life, and as such are of a particular interest to scientists working to understand both how life developed on Earth, and how it could potentially develop elsewhere in our universe. As such, the study of interstellar organic (carbon-containing) chemistry is an area of keen fascination to many astronomers.

An international team of astronomers has used NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to detect a carbon compound known as methyl cation for the first time. This molecule is important because it aids the formation of more complex carbon-based molecules. It was found in a young star system with a protoplanetary disk, 1,350 light-years away in the Orion Nebula.