New insights from NASA's OSIRIS-REx mission have unveiled intriguing clues about the potential origins of life on Earth. The mission, which launched in Septembe
Bennu samples brought back by a University of Arizona-led space mission contain the key ingredients of life and signs of the stew needed to mix them.
Samples of organic matter returned from the asteroid Bennu support the theory that asteroids could have brought the building blocks of life to Earth.
This artist’s concept shows NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft descending towards asteroid Bennu to collect a sample of the asteroid’s surface. NASA/Goddard/University of Arizona Scientists studying the sample collected in 2023 from asteroid Bennu have announced a dramatic finding: they have identified the key building blocks of life within the sample.
The building blocks for life, including salts, organic matter and amino acids have been found in samples returned to Earth from outer space.
Researchers say the asteroid Bennu has the building blocks for life on it. The samples collected and returned to Earth were part of the University of Arizona-led OSIRS-REx mission.
NASA scientists found amino acids, key minerals, and nucleobases for DNA in samples from the OSIRIS-REx asteroid mission. It's a win for alien life.
When asteroids like Bennu hit the young Earth, they could have provided a complete package of complex molecules and the ingredients essential to life, such as water, phosphate and ammonia. Together, these components could have seeded Earth’s initially barren landscape to produce a habitable world.
The building blocks for organic matter have been discovered on the asteroid Bennu, as deatiled in a new study in the journal Nature Astronomy. The research gives new insight into how life originated on Earth and where we might find it elsewhere in the universe.
A capsule carrying about a half cup of dust and rocks from an ancient asteroid named Bennu landed in the Utah desert in 2023. The samples were collected by NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission, which sent a probe to rendezvous with Bennu in outer space.
NASA's Osiris-Rex mission has uncovered invaluable samples from asteroid Bennu, revealing ancient salty minerals and amino acids. This discovery suggests that asteroids could have contributed to the origins of life on Earth.