Samples of rocks and dust from the asteroid Bennu, which is located near Earth, contain organic matter, including amino acids and all the five dna and RNA nuclei, as well as salts formed early in its history. These findings offer new information on the chemistry of the early solar system.

The above is presented in two studies published in the journals “Nature Astronomy” and “Nature”.

In 2018 the shipment Osiris-rex He reached the nearby asteroid Bennu to collect samples. This asteroid has long caught the interest of researchers because of its orbit near the Earth and its rich in carbon composition. Analyzing these samples, which are the first samples from the asteroid surface that NASA received in space and the unique collected from a planetary body for almost 50 years after Apollo missions, the researchers found thousands of organic molecular compounds. These associations included 14 out of 20 protein amino acids They exist in Earth’s life forms, 19 non -protein amino acids that are rare or absent from biology and all five biological nucleoats (adenine, cytosine, guanine, thymine and uracil).

It was also found that the asteroid is rich in compounds containing nitrogen and ammonia, which were formed billions of years ago in cold, distant areas of our solar system. The researchers note in their study, published in the Nature Astronomy, that Bennu has a much richer complexity in organic material than earthy biology and suggest that the body from which the asteroid came from the external solar system.

In the second publication in Nature, the researchers analyzed the samples and found a variety of saline minerals, including sodium -containing phosphates and sodium -rich salts, salts, salts and salts. These salts may have been formed during the evaporation of the salty fluid that existed early in the history of the body from which Bennu came, indicating that there was once water. The possible presence of water along with nucleoats raises questions about the process that creates the structural elements of life (probiotic synthesis of organic molecules), which will require further research.