hckrnws

"That's nothing, I can find new molecules just by aiming my telescope at any of those bright dots." :p

Sounds like this is interesting because 2-methoxyethanol (C3H8O2) is one of the more structurally-complex ones we've managed to detect, although the article doesn't go into whether that has any significance to potential biologies. Here on earth it's often found as a solvent, such as in nail-polish.

> We do this by looking at the rotational spectra of molecules, the unique patterns of light they give off as they tumble end-over-end in space.

That seems poetically similar finding exoplanets going around and periodicially dimming of their parent stars, except on the very small end instead of the very big one.

> We do this by looking at the rotational spectra of molecules

That's a much deeper rabbit hole than I was expecting!

I assumed the spectrum would be something simple, like the sum of the spectrum of the molecule at any angle, with the differences at each angle caused by maybe different vibration modes from the structure viewed at that angle. But no! Rotational energy is quantized, and it comes from the absorption/emission from transitions between these quantized levels!

It appears the technical humor in your first sentence was missed by some. :)

Spice?

If only.