On June 8, the topic of “First confirmation of the existence of the source of life outside the earth” topped the trending search.
According to CCTV News, citing the Nihon Keizai Shimbun report on June 6, the asteroid probe Hayabusa 2 of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency discovered the “source of life” in the sand samples brought back to Earth from the asteroid “Ryugu” – Amino acids. This is the first time the existence of amino acids has been confirmed outside of Earth.
According to the Weibo news of Science and Technology Daily, according to Japanese media reports, the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology of Japan said that scientists detected more than 20 amino acids in samples collected by the asteroid probe Hayabusa 2. This is the first evidence of the existence of amino acids outside Earth.
In December 2020, the recovery module of “Hyabusa 2” returned to Earth from the asteroid “Ryugu” and brought back about 5.4 grams of planetary surface samples. Kobayashi Kenzheng, an honorary professor of astrobiology at Yokohama National University in Japan, said that the discovery of multiple amino acids on celestial bodies other than Earth is “unprecedented”, and may even suggest the existence of life beyond Earth, which also means that amino acids may exist on other planets and natural satellites. suggesting that life may have been born in more places in the universe than previously thought.
This time, the samples collected by Hayabusa2 came from asteroid subsurface material that was not eroded by sunlight or cosmic rays. The analysis was carried out without exposing it to Earth’s air, which means the first time for researchers It has been confirmed that the building blocks of life also exist in outer space.
Image source: Screenshot of Science and Technology Daily video