NASA scientists have made an incredible discovery while studying rock and dust samples from asteroid Bennu that were delivered to Earth by the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft. The pristine samples contain 14 of the 20 amino acids that life on Earth uses to make proteins, plus all five nucleobases that life uses to store and transmit genetic instructions in DNA and RNA. Scientists also found exceptionally high amounts of ammonia, which can react with formaldehyde to form complex molecules like amino acids under the right conditions. These amazing building blocks for life have been detected before in meteorites, but finding them in a sample collected directly from space supports the exciting idea that the ingredients for life were widespread throughout the early solar system.
The researchers also discovered traces of 11 different minerals that form when water containing dissolved salts evaporates over long periods of time, creating evidence of an ancient environment that could have kickstarted the chemistry of life. Some of these minerals, like trona, were found in extraterrestrial samples for the very first time. While the samples don’t show evidence of life itself, they suggest that the conditions necessary for life to emerge were common across the early solar system, increasing the chances that life could have formed on other planets and moons. NASA’s groundbreaking OSIRIS-REx mission continues to rewrite our understanding of how life’s ingredients came together in our cosmic neighborhood.