The intrinsic 3D shape of prestellar cores holds important clues about star formation processes. However, projection effects create degeneracies amongst different intrinsic 3D shape (see movie bellow).

Based on numerical simulations we have found that when cores are observed through the chemical lens this degeneracy breaks. The degeneracy is lifted simply because of the different path of integration and the different molecular abundance distribution in cores with different geometries. Therefore, molecular column density maps can be used to deproject prestellar cores and probe their true 3D shape.