The asteroid Bennu has provided groundbreaking insights into the chemistry that may have set the stage for life in the early ...
Scientists have detected organic compounds and minerals necessary for life in the samples collected by the OSIRIS-REx mission ...
The OSIRIS-REx mission returned to the sample to Earth in September of 2023, and these studies show that it contains amino ...
The asteroid in question, named Bennu, was the focus of a very dreamy NASA mission called OSIRIS-REx that launched in 2016.
When exposed to formaldehyde, which was also detected, ammonia can form amino acids, the building blocks of proteins.
In October 2020, a van-sized robotic spacecraft briefly touched down on the surface of Bennu, a 525-meter-wide asteroid 320 million kilometers from Earth.
The DNA ingredients discovered on the asteroid Bennu by NASA's OSIRIS-REx mission suggest that life-building blocks exist ...