Bennu asteroid samples reveal life’s building blocks, new studies show
But the new research found evaporated water on Bennu’s parent asteroid left behind “the raw ingredients of life”, said Tim McCoy, curator of meteorites at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History and co-lead author of one of the studies.“We have discovered that next step on a pathway to life,” he said in a press release issued by the museum.Bennu appears to have formed around 65 million years ago from the debris of a parent asteroid dating back some 4.5 billion years.The findings suggest Bennu’s parent was once home to pockets of liquid water. When these evaporated, they left behind a “briny broth” of salts and minerals.AdvertisementAdvertise with NZME.The discovery could lend support to the theory that life on Earth was seeded from outer space. Photo / SuppliedSome of the mine...