Recently scientists have discovered one plausible pathway for how protocells may have first formed and chemically progressed to allow for a diversity of functions.
The research team investigated how the emergence of the first living systems from inert geological materials happened on Earth more than 3.5 billion years ago.
The discovery of phosphorus in a molecular cloud at the edge of the Milky Way galaxy extends the presence of the element almost twice as far out as where it was known to exist.
Most of what we know about Enceladus and its ice-covered ocean comes from the Cassini mission. New research based on Cassini data strengthens the idea that Enceladus has the chemicals necessary for life.
Initial studies of the 4.5-billion-year-old asteroid Bennu sample collected in space and brought to Earth by NASA show evidence of high-carbon content and water.
Now, using the James Webb Space Telescope, astronomers have found carbon on Europa’s surface, which likely originated in this ocean. The discovery signals a potentially habitable environment in the ocean of Europa.
U.S. scientists argue that chance alone cannot consistently produce the highly complex molecules found in all living creatures. To produce billions of copies of intricate objects like proteins, human hands, or iPhones, the universe needs a 'memory'.
According to the research, nature could have selected building blocks with useful properties before the Darwinian evolution.
An international team has analyzed samples taken from the asteroid Ryugu in 2018 by the Hayabusa2 mission and found uracil, one of the five key bases of the RNA and DNA molecules that are crucial to life as we know it.
In a molecular cloud called Chamaeleon I data from the telescope has revealed the presence of frozen carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, and sulfur – elements vital to the formation of atmospheres and molecules.
How life emerged on Earth from an assortment of non-living molecules is a stubbornly enduring mystery but now we could have some more clues thanks to a recent study.
NASA scientists said Thursday the Mars Perseverance rover found biologically-interesting rocks in an ancient lake bed that could indicate microbial life existed on the red planet billions of years ago.
the team's overall results suggest that carbon dioxide was a vital ingredient for the emergence of life on Earth – but only when combined with other ingredients.
We still don't know just how the first life emerged on Earth. One suggestion is that the building blocks arrived here from space; now, a new study of several carbon-rich meteorites has added weight to this idea.
Japanese researchers have discovered more than 20 amino acids on the space rock Ryugu, which is more than 200 million miles (320 million kilometers) from Earth.
