Perhaps life on Earth came from space. At least, that’s the general consensus, especially after recent observations of samples from the asteroid Ryugu. According to the researchers who reviewed the samples, Ryugu appears to contain several “organic prebiotics,” including several different types of amino acids. These amino acids are often called “the building blocks of life,” and this may contribute to theories that life began in space.

Or at least that the essential ingredients for life were given to the planet in its embryonic state by asteroids, meteorites, and other space rocks. In fact, the Hayabusa2 spacecraft, delivering samples from Ryugu, is just one of several different missions to determine what asteroids in our solar system are made of.

We hope astronomers can learn more about ancient asteroids in our solar system and put the pieces of the puzzle together and come up with a testable theory of where life came from. Therefore, finding the building blocks of life in samples from Ryugu is of primary importance to the task of determining where life on Earth came from.

It’s also not the first time we’ve seen evidence that these building blocks of life came from outer space. Other samples from meteorites and other asteroids also supported these beliefs, providing evidence of ancient waters that had not yet been contaminated by our own planet. Findings found in Ryugu samples are also consistent with those found in carbon-rich meteorites.

These are often the meteorites that experience the most water in space, and give us a better idea of ​​what kinds of water might have formed in space so scientists can determine how that water was formed and where it might have come from. Determining this could allow us to determine where water originates on Earth.

Research on Ryugu specimens has been published in the journal Science. The researchers plan to compare the Ryugu sample with a sample from asteroid Bennu when NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission returns to Earth this year.