Laboratory Astrophysics Databases of Grains and Ices

Interstellar dust and ice play a major role in the thermodynamical and chemical evolution of the interstellar medium (ISM), protoplanetary and planetary disks, and planets. Dust including non-refractory ices and refractory dust grains absorb and scatter stellar light and can reemit the absorbed energy from infrared to
millimeter wavelengths. In addition, it influences the formation rate of H2 and many other complex organic
molecules being formed either on bare surfaces or in molecular ices on top of grains. Previous and recent
IR observations with the observatories ISO, Spitzer, Herschel, and now JWST provided and will provide a
wealth of new spectroscopic data, characterizing solid dust and ice components in various environments.
The analysis of observed spectral features delivers important information on grain sizes, composition, and
structure as well as temperature and spatial distribution of the material. For the interpretation of observations and the modelling of important astrophysical processes such as disk and planet formation, the spectral properties of dust and ice in a broad wavelength range are required. The relevant spectral data for interstellar, circumstellar, and protoplanetary grains and ices at different levels of photon-, ion-, thermal-, and collisional induced modifications can be obtained by measurements of cosmic dust and ice analogs in the laboratory. An understanding of both macro- and micro-physical properties of the dust and ice and how these properties evolve with the environment is indispensable. Databases of dust and ice materials are required to offer not only the spectral data, but also important information on the specific properties of the materials and measurement procedures. The current state of databases of optical constants or absorption data of solids containing information on the samples and references to relevant papers as well as information to the measurements or calculations will be discussed.