Chemical evolution in high-mass star forming regions

Growing evidence shows that most stars in the Milky Way, including the Sun, are born in high-mass star-forming regions, but due to both observational and theoretical challenges, our understanding of their chemical evolution is still unclear. Thanks to the capabilities of new generation telescopes and computers, a growing amount of observational and theoretical results have been recently obtained, which have important implications not only for our understanding of the still mysterious formation process of high-mass stars, but also for the chemistry that the primordial Solar System might have inherited from its birth environment.

This thesis is part of the project 'CHemical Evolution of MassIve star-forming COres' (CHEMICO). The project aims to investigate aspects of the chemical evolution of high-mass star-forming regions through millimeter observations of important molecules, including organic and pre-biotic molecules, towards the best representatives of the main evolutionary stages. The thesis goal is to identify reliable chemical evolutionary indicators, and find what molecules with biogenic potential could have been inherited by the Solar system from its star-forming cloud.