IFL Science reports on the 121-gram sample that NASA’s OSIRIS-REx probe collected from Asteroid Bennu — a handful of dirt that shows a wealth of chemicals necessary to form the foundation of life in the early solar system, including never-before-seen amino acids:
As described in two new papers, scientists working on the samples found thousands of different organic compounds. They reported the discovery of 14 out of the 20 amino acids that make proteins in all living organisms on Earth. They also found 19 amino acids that do not make any proteins, some of which were known and rare and some even absent in known biology. They also found all five nucleobases. The four found in DNA – adenine, guanine, cytosine, thymine – as well as uracil which takes the place of thymine in RNA.
The team was quick to clarify what this does – and does not – mean for life in the universe, however. “Bennu contains many precursors to the building blocks of life. The findings do not show any evidence for life on Bennu but it shows that the conditions for life were widespread in the early Solar System,” Nicky Fox, associate administrator, Science Mission Directorate from NASA Headquarters, said in a press conference.
The team also discovered more compounds rich in nitrogen and ammonia. Ammonia in particular suggests that the parent body of Bennu was likely further away from the Sun than the asteroid it is now. Bennu is a near-Earth object (and actually the one most likely to hit Earth) but it must have formed in the colder regions of the Solar System where ammonia ice and other volatiles were stable.
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“There were things in the samples that completely blew us away. The richness of the molecules and minerals preserved are unlike any extraterrestrial samples studied before. Comparing the sample return to meteorites in our Collection, using state-of-the-art analytical facilities here in the Museum, is invaluable in helping us understand our origins,” said Prof. Sara Russell, cosmic mineralogist at the Natural History Museum, London and co-lead author of the paper published in Nature, in a statement sent to IFLScience.
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You can read more of the Bennu findings here, in Nature Astronomy, and here, in Nature.