Astronomers have detected the simple sugar erythrulose between the stars, adding to growing evidence that some of life’s essential ingredients may form before planets even exist.
The chemical ingredients for life may begin assembling far earlier than scientists once believed.
Researchers in Spain have identified evidence of erythrulose, a simple sugar, within a giant molecular cloud—the cold, dense regions of gas and dust where new stars and planetary systems eventually form. The discovery, as reported by the Smithsonian Magazine, adds another piece to a growing body of evidence suggesting that complex organic chemistry begins in interstellar space, well before planets exist.
Erythrulose is a four-carbon sugar found naturally in foods such as raspberries and is also used in some self-tanning cosmetics. More importantly, it belongs to a family of simple sugars known as monosaccharides, molecules that are fundamental to biological chemistry.
Scientists note, according to PBS, that sugars form the structural backbone of RNA and DNA, making them essential ingredients for life as we know it. Previous missions, including NASA’s study of asteroid Bennu, have already detected other biologically significant sugars such as ribose and glucose. This new finding suggests that such compounds may originate even earlier, within the molecular clouds that eventually give birth to stars and planets.
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If these sugars can form naturally in the harsh conditions of interstellar space, the same chemistry could be occurring throughout the Milky Way—and perhaps in other galaxies as well.
The discovery does not demonstrate that life exists elsewhere, nor does it explain how life begins. However, it strengthens the idea that some of life’s fundamental building blocks may be common throughout the cosmos rather than unique to Earth.
For researchers studying the origin of life, that possibility shifts an important question. Instead of asking whether the ingredients for life are rare, scientists may increasingly ask how often those ingredients come together under the right conditions to become something living.
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This just adds more to Robert Lanza’s idea that biology may be the central driving science in our Universe (biocentrism). I read his book ‘Biocentrism’ years ago and it totally resonated with me. From his site:
“Biocentrism (theory of everything) from Greek: βίος, bios, “life”; and κέντρον, kentron, “center” — also known as the biocentric universe — is a theory proposed in 2007 by American scientist Robert Lanza, which sees biology as the central driving science in the universe, and an understanding of the other sciences as reliant on a deeper understanding of biology. Lanza believes that life and biology are central to being, reality, and the cosmos—consciousness creates the universe rather than the other way around. While physics is considered fundamental to the study of the universe, and chemistry fundamental to the study of life, Lanza claims that scientists will need to place biology before the other sciences to produce a “theory of everything”.”