Conjuring up images from the movie “It came from Outer Space“, it turns out we may all be from space. Some of us are “spacier” than others. This news of finding the building blocks of life in a meteorite comes as a small surprise. I swear though I’m not related to anyone in Chico by by more than 17,000 AU.
Scientists have confirmed that the components of genetic material could have originated in a place other than Earth.
A recently published report explains how uracil and xanthine, two basic biological compounds, were found within a meteorite that landed in Australia.
The Murchinson Meteorite, more here
Here is the paper: “Extraterrestrial nucleobases in the Murchison meteorite”, Earth and Planetary Science Letters, Sunday 15 June 2008 (Print publication)
A full copy of the research (HTML and PDF) can be downloaded at:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.epsl.2008.03.026
Excerpt:
“They tested the meteorite material to determine whether the molecules came from the solar system or were a result of contamination when the meteorite landed on Earth. The analysis shows that the nucleobases contain a heavy form of carbon which could only have been formed in space. Materials formed on Earth consist of a lighter variety of carbon.”
Here is the full press release:
Imperial College News Release
For Immediate Release:
Friday 13 June 2008
Scientists have confirmed for the first time that an important component of early genetic material which has been found in meteorite fragments is extraterrestrial in origin, in a paper published on 15 June 2008.
The finding suggests that parts of the raw materials to make the first molecules of DNA and RNA may have come from the stars.
The scientists, from Europe and the USA, say that their research, published in the journal Earth and Planetary Science Letters, provides evidence that life’s raw materials came from sources beyond the Earth.
The team discovered the molecules in rock fragments of the Murchison meteorite, which crashed in Australia in 1969.
They tested the meteorite material to determine whether the molecules came from the solar system or were a result of contamination when the meteorite landed on Earth.
The analysis shows that the nucleobases contain a heavy form of carbon which could only have been formed in space. Materials formed on Earth consist of a lighter variety of carbon.
Lead author Dr Zita Martins, of the Department of Earth Science and Engineering at Imperial College London, says that the research may provide another piece of evidence explaining the evolution of early life. She says:
“We believe early life may have adopted nucleobases from meteoritic fragments for use in genetic coding which enabled them to pass on their successful features to subsequent generations.”
Between 3.8 to 4.5 billion years ago large numbers of rocks similar to the Murchison meteorite rained down on Earth at the time when primitive life was forming. The heavy bombardment would have dropped large amounts of meteorite material to the surface on planets like Earth and Mars.
Co-author Professor Mark Sephton, also of Imperial’s Department of Earth Science and Engineering, believes this research is an important step in understanding how early life might have evolved. He added:
“Because meteorites represent left over materials from the formation of the solar system, the key components for life — including nucleobases — could be widespread in the cosmos. As more and more of life’s raw materials are discovered in objects from space, the possibility of life springing forth wherever the right chemistry is present becomes more likely.”
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I read somewhere that even if the entire universe was converted to just the amino acids found in life and allowed to react for the life of the universe, that even the simplest form of life capable of evolving would be statistically impossible.
A solution to this problem is to postulate an infinite number of universes and that we just happen to be in a “lucky” one or else we would not be able to notice how lucky we. Those other universes, I understand, are undetectable even in principle. This leaves one with the ironic necessity of “faith” in order to believe in them.
Bring on the abuse.
Reminds me of the movie “Expelled”. Choose your faith,
Mike Bryant
Life began down here in Australia? That’s news to you? Crikey; we’ve always known that, but y’all have even ignored one of your own when he alerted you:
“Australian history …..does not read like history, but like the most beautiful lies; and all of a fresh new sort, no mouldy old stale ones. It is full of surprises and adventures, and incongruities, and contradictions, and incredibilities; but they are all true, they all happened.” Mark Twain from “More Tramps Abroad” (1897)
Unrelated, but daily satellites are warmer than last year for first time this year…
jeez…. first we had Darwin sayin’ me Gran’ mother woz a Monkey….. Now she’s a rock from outa space…… !
*wink* couldn’t help meself. Thought I’d get the Creationists in on th’ act…
Ah, “building blocks”, like molecules of Guanine, Uracil, Deoxyribose, etc.
Reminds me of Sagan’s theories from the 50’s following Urey and Miller’s work. DNA was first constructed inorganically in glaciers over the eons.
So Gaia is not ‘Our Mother’ but the ‘Cosmos’.
The material that makes up meteorites also collected together to form the Earth. Humans and the Earth, itself, are space debris but there is no reason to expect that complex organic molecules (and water) came from space after the Earth formed.
I imagine sufficient quantities of everything was here already.
(We often hear how scientists say the water on Earth came from comet bombardment in the early Earth. But there always was lots of water in the material that formed Earth. In addition, there was lots of hydrogen and oxygen atoms in that material and, eventually, those two atoms were going to form up to produce the water molecule. The bonds are so strong and the reaction is more-or-less destined to occur – hydrogen burns very easily and that burning is actually the reaction with oxygen that forms water.)
Of course, other than hydrogen, helium and a little lithium, all the other atoms that make up Earth were once inside the interior of other stars and the elements heavier than iron were all inside a number of different supernovas, so we really are space debris.
Anyone who ever got broke when the Two Seat put all his money in the pot, dead to the “four of clubs,” and hit it knows that “Odds” don’t mean nothin.
Uracil molecules contain twelve atoms, and Xanthine contains fifteen. DNA molecules contain ten million atoms. It is a quite a stretch to believe that DNA could “spring” from such simple molecules. The universe is dominantly entropic, and the huge increase in order required is unreasonable.
We do not see any existing life forms simpler than DNA based, and we do not see the claimed progression of Uracil->DNA repeating itself anywhere in the universe – including earth. Both of these are essential requirements of evolutionary theory, yet we see neither.
The evidence for a random origin of life is much poorer than the flimsy evidence for AGW. At the time Darwin made his theories, it was believed that “simple” life forms like lichens were in fact very “simple.” We now know that isn’t true, and it is time to advance the science past 150 years ago. Hard core Darwinists are stuck in the distant past, and it is time to end the dogma on all scientific fronts. They are even more clueless than the bible thumpers.
So, what they’re saying is that life was here, just that meteorites may have contributed their own DNA building blocks. Interesting theory. The article doesn’t talk about how life actually begins, which is a whole ‘nother ball of wax. I personally am a proponent of the scientist Wilhelm Reich’s works in that regard.
Great. Now I have to send out yet another invite to a relative for my family reunion. Maybe I can just say I mailed out the invite, but it must have gotten lost in the mail. I have some boring relatives, but “Rock” really takes the cake…
I always new my step mother was an alien.
So… extraterrestrial soot deposition?
http://www.earthsky.org/radioshows/52560/scientists-seek-link-to-climate-change-in-arctic-haze
Steve Stip:
As for the old timeless unary one, no need to be apologetic. The assault on religion in western culture is grossly out of balance. It does indeed require faith to accept abstruse mathematical speculations in cosmology. But after a point the dilemma becomes obvious: It’s turtles all the way down!
A lot of atheists have gone for Gaia-science as their replacement religion. I say this as a non-theist. Y’know? A heathen in the back-pews… 🙂
Their cause celebre fills a God-shaped hole in their lives. I know how it sounds ironic for me to say this but I’d rather the susceptible go back to believing in God, at least there are broad humanist standards that aren’t driven by a media-powered elite. Some of the angry anti-theistic garbage that passes as atheism is just plain mean.
I’m also Buddhist but just as far in the back pews as I am in any other religion. My friend says I have all the makings of a bad Catholic. I hear the first ring of Hell has both stadium heating and visitation rights.
🙂
D’oh! That was supposed to read “stadium seating.”
Hmm…..
Man from meteorites . . . how farfetched.
“The finding suggests that parts of the raw materials to make the first molecules of DNA and RNA may have come from the stars”
Surely any ‘raw materials’ heavier than Hydrogen came from the stars at some point in time, we are all made up of stardust!
Very believable. I’ve dated women from outer space, others were convinced I crawled out from under a rock…)
Slightly more seriously, scientists have ‘created’ some of the DNA building blocks by electrically zapping chemicals thought to be in primitive Earth’s environment. Maybe carbon has a predisposition to assemble in certain ways.
As for what preceeded the Big Bang, I’ve long though a loud voice saying “Let there be light” would fit the requirement.
leebert,
I’ll bring ice water when I visit.
I guess this explains the rocks in my head. Are these meteorites God’s carbon footprints on the path to celestial caused climate change?
Steve Stip —
I’ve heard this argument before and have always found it to be lacking. It’s not been thought through, although it sounds eminently reasonable on the surface.
A lot of stuff is statistically improbable if you assume mere randomness. One example of a creationist argument illustrating randomness is that you can put say 20 parts of a meat grinder in a clothes dryer and let it tumble for a thousand years and *still* not have anything other than 20 random parts when you were done — no meat grinder, no self-assembly. Stuff doesn’t self-assemble, thus Darwinist thought is said to be disproven.
But then again, this argument is false. There is no natural reason for the parts to *want* to mate up. But in the atomic universe this is not the case. Due to valence and so on, hydrogen atoms *want* to bond to oxygen atoms and create water. Similarly, atoms within certain molecules *want* to bond to other atoms. This is especially true in favourable conditions. Suddenly, the apparent randomness is no longer very random, and more complex atomic chains are not only unsurprising but expected.
DNA is a prime example… G, T, A and C molecules *want* to bond to each other, and will do so spontaneously. They do so in known pairs. This isn’t by accident or randomness, but as the result of their atomic construction. In short, there isn’t as much randomness as claimed. My question is what the motivation is for such claims — are they propagated by those who fail to think it through or by those with a fundamentalist agenda?
there is no contextual difference between “in the beginning God said “let there be light” and describing the singularity that is referred to as the big bang – there is however (to my feeble neurons anyway) a 180 degree difference in mental processes. The former is handed down from on high, unalterable, unquestionable, and non-falsifiable. The latter implies questioning, wondering and experimentation – and the ability to discard theories that do not adhere to observation and measurement.
G. Alston
From what I understand, amino acids do “desire” to link up. It is not the “desire” to link up that is in question but the probability of forming a system that can replicate and evolve. From what I understand, amino acids don’t have much preference in bonding with each other. But even if this is false, I can think of another thought experiment. Convert the entire universe to the amino acids necessary for DNA and let them react for 15 billion years. Would that give a DNA strand (neglecting the other components necessary for a life form) that could evolve?
I am neither a chemist or a mathematician. I have read that the evolutionists and the mathematicians broke up in 1964 over the improbability of the origin of life by chance alone.
I do not say that the origin of life is impossible by chance alone; just that it is statistically impossible in THIS universe given its size and age.
Life could not have originated in this universe by chance alone. But what about an infinitely old and/or large universe? Then anything is possible including the chance formation and evolution of a Creator.
This universe may simply be a big crib.
By the way, I am indebted to Dr. Hugh Ross for the above info.
As for agendas, just this, that science quit dismissing the idea of a Creator out of hand. It is as silly as ants in an ant farm dismissing the possibility of humans.
G. Alston,
If what you are saying were true, we would see –
1. Many different types of GTAC based life – not just DNA based.
2. The process of life evolving from basic building blocks repeating over and over again.
3. Life all over the universe.
We see none of the above. Obviously there is a critical component to the equation which is non-random.
Forgive me, true scientists would not dismiss that possibility. Perhaps they should reign in their over enthusiastic fellows and disciples though.
And we’ve looked in SOOO many places in the universe. Some theories may never be experimentable, but the alternative, a big sky daddy, is simply so silly it doesn’t deserve discussion.