Asteroid Bennu has all the ingredients for life as we know it
9 days ago
- #space exploration
- #astrobiology
- #origin of life
- Essential ingredients for life found in asteroid Bennu samples.
- NASA's OSIRIS-REx mission collected 121 grams from Bennu in 2020, returned to Earth in 2023.
- Initial studies detected water, carbon, organic molecules, amino acids, formaldehyde, and nucleobases.
- Recent analysis by Yoshihiro Furukawa's team identified ribose and other sugars, but not deoxyribose.
- Findings support the RNA world hypothesis for the origin of life.
- Evidence suggests brines on Bennu's parent body could have facilitated organic molecule formation.
- Similar conditions may exist on Enceladus and Ceres, indicating widespread potential for life's ingredients.
- Discovery confirms previous meteorite findings, ruling out Earth contamination concerns.