  To study the impact of the initial effects of metallicity (i.e., the
abundance of elements heavier than helium) on star formation and the formation
of different molecular species, we searched for hot molecular cores in the
sub-solar metallicity environment of the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). We
conducted an ALMA Band 6 observations of 20 fields centered on young stellar
objects (YSOs) distributed over the LMC in order to search for hot molecular
cores in this galaxy. We detected a total of 65 compact 1.2 mm continuum cores
in the 20 ALMA fields and analyzed their spectra with XCLASS software. The main
temperature tracers are CH3OH and SO2, with more than two transitions detected
in the observed frequency ranges. Other molecular lines with high detection
rates in our sample are CS , SO, H13CO+, H13CN, HC15 N, and SiO. More complex
molecules, such as HNCO, HDCO, HC3N, CH3CN, and NH2CHO, and multiple
transitions of SO and SO2 isotopologues showed tentative or definite detection
toward a small subset of the cores. According to the chemical richness of the
cores and high temperatures from the XCLASS fitting, we report the detection of
four hot cores and one hot core candidate. With one new hot core detection in
this study, the number of detected hot cores in the LMC increases to seven. Six
out of seven hot cores detected in the LMC to date are located in the stellar
bar region of this galaxy. These six hot cores show emission from complex
organic molecules (COMs), such as CH3OH, CH3CN, CH3OCHO, and CH3OCH3. The only
known hot core in the LMC with no detection of COMs is located outside the bar
region. The metallicity in the LMC presents a shallow gradient increasing from
outer regions toward the bar. We suggest that the formation of hot molecular
cores containing COMs ensues from the new generation of stars forming in the
more metal-rich environment of the LMC bar.
