Takeshi Oka
Takeshi made one of the breakthroughs of the century, the detection of the spectrum of H3+.
Papers and articles
- 'Observation of the Infrared Spectrum of H3+', APS Physics, 1980.
- Introductory remarks by Takeshi Oka (PDF, 225KB). The inspiring developments in physics, chemistry and astronomy of H3+ are summarised.
- My 45 Years of Astrochemistry: Memoirs of Takeshi Oka (PDF, 166KB).
- The infrared spectrum of H3+ in laboratory and space plasmas (PDF, 1.65MB).
- Interstellar H3+ (PDF, 1.92MB), PNAS, Special feature: Perspective.
- 'Application of laser spectroscopy to fundamental molecular species: H3+ and solid H2' (PDF, 2.42MB), Frontiers in laser spectroscopy.
- 'Extraordinary molecules in interstellar space' (PDF, 328KB), Atomic Physics 10, 1987.
Sir Harry Kroto spoke about Takeshi Oka and the paper 'Extraordinary molecules in interstellar space' (PDF, 328KB).
In this paper, for some reason Takeshi missed out the most extraordinary molecules, the polyynes which he and I detected with Lorne Avery, Norm Broten and John McLeod.
The reason was that a chain of nine C atoms seemed to me impossible to create in the molecular clouds in which we observed them (the main reason for doing the experiment which uncovered C60’s existence).
Sir Harry Kroto
He continued, "Now with the detection of C60+ in the diffuse ISM by Maier’s group, we have a possible explanation. C60+ may be the vehicle which transports the molecular carbon aggregates from the star in which it is formed and perhaps finally broken down by cosmic rays or multiple photon fragmentation into such species as HC9N."