How Asteroid Ryugu Shakes Up Theories on Life's Origins
The enigmatic quest to decode life's origins has taken a monumental leap with the discovery of uracil—a key building block for life—in asteroid Ryugu. Extracted by the Hayabusa 2 spacecraft, this 4.5-billion-year-old sample is the purest, ancient extraterrestrial matter ever examined.
The enigmatic quest to decode the origins of life has always oscillated between the celestial and the terrestrial, the empirical and the spiritual. From Creationist dogmas that explain life as an act of divine providence to scientific theories like Oparin's primordial soup and Miller's groundbreaking experiments, the explanations have been manifold.
Among these intellectual discourses, the hypothesis of Panspermia has captivated imaginations since the late 19th century. The theory, radical in its implications, posits that the primordial elements for life may have been extraterrestrial, arriving at Earth via meteorites carrying microbial life or spores, and flourishing in the nascent oceans of our planet.
