Molecules at High Redshifts

Abstract

After the recombination of Hydrogen, primordial molecules such as H_2, $HD$ can be formed.The formation of structures in the post-recombination gaseous medium is commonly explained by primordial density fluctuations. In a self-gravitating collapsing cloud, temperature tends to increase with contraction. In this context molecular lines emissions can play an important role in the thermal balance of collapsing molecular clouds and in the dynamics of collapsing proto-cloud. We calculate analytically the molecular cooling due to H_2 and $HD$. Our analysis is done under the hypothesis we consider only the first two excited levels of the H_2 and $HD$ molecules. The potentiality of fragmentation of collapsing protoclouds through the thermal instability is discussed. Finally we suggest that this study could also be extended to the $CO$ molecule.