Asteroid samples Retained by NASA Keep not only pristine construction blocks for life, but also the salty remains of an ancient water world, scientists reported Wednesday.
The findings provide the stronger evidence so far that asteroids may have planted the seeds of life on Earth and that these ingredients mixed with water almost from the beginning.
“That is the type of environment that could have been essential for the steps that lead from elements to life,” said Tim McCoy of the Smithsonian institution, one of the authors of the main study.
POT Osiris-Rex spacecraft returned 122 grams (4 ounces) of dust and pebbles from the nearby land asteroid Bennu, delivering the boat sample to the Utah desert in 2023 before leaving after another space rock. It remains the biggest cosmic route beyond the moon. The two sample missions of previous asteroids, by Japan, threw considerably less material.
Small amounts of the beautiful black grains of Bennu, leftover of the formation of the solar system 4.5 billion years ago, were distributed to the two separate research teams whose studies appeared in the magazines nature and astronomy of nature. But it was more than enough to discover sodium -rich minerals and confirm the presence of amino acids, nitrogen in the form of ammonia and even parts of the genetic code.
Some if not all the delicate salts found in Bennu, similar to what is in the dry beds of the Mojave de California desert and the Sahara of Africa, would be stripped if present in meteorites that fall.
“This discovery was only possible through the analysis of samples that were collected directly from the asteroid and then they were carefully preserved on Earth,” he said in an editorial of the Tokyo Tokyo Institute of Sciences, who did not participate in the studies, in an accompanying publisher .
Combining the ingredients of life with a salty water environment rich in sodium, or salmueras, “that is really the way to life,” said McCoy, a meteor curator of the National Museum of Natural History. “These processes probably occurred long before and were much more widespread than we had thought before.”
NASA Daniel Glavin said one of the biggest surprises was the relatively high nitrogen abundance, including ammonia. While all organic molecules found in Bennu samples have been identified before in meteorites, Glavin said that Bennu’s are valid: “real extraterrestrial organic material formed in space and is not the result of land pollution.”
Bennu, a pile of debris only one third of one mile (half a kilometer) wide, was originally part of a much larger asteroid that was beaten by other space rocks. The last results suggest that this main body had an extensive underground network of lakes or even oceans, and that the water evaporated, leaving the salty clues behind.
Sixty laboratories worldwide are analyzing Bennu Bits as part of the initial studies, said Dante Lauretta of the University of Arizona, the main scientist of the mission that participated in both studies.
Most of the mission cache of $ 1 billion has been reserved for a future analysis. Scientists emphasize more evidence to better understand Bennu samples, as well as more asteroid and comets sample returns. China plans to launch an asteroid sample return mission this year.
Many are pressing for a mission to collect rocks and dirt from the potentially watered dwarf planet Ceres in the main asteroid belt. Jupiter’s moon Europe and Saturn’s moon Alceladus also sign as tempting water worlds. Meanwhile, NASA has central samples that wait for collected on Mars, but its delivery is waiting while the space agency studies the fastest and most cheap way to get them here.
“Are we alone?” McCoy said. “That is one of the questions we are trying to answer.”
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