chemistry
The Building Blocks of Earth Could Have Come From Farther out in the Solar System
Earth formed over 4.5 billion years ago via accretion. Earth's building blocks were chunks of rock of varying sizes. From…
Even More Complex Organic Molecules Have Been Found in a Protoplanetary Disc. Was Life Inevitable?
Will we ever understand life's origins? Will we ever be able to put our finger on the exact moment and…
What’s it Like Inside a Super-Earth?
We know a ton about the inside of Earth. We know it has both an inner core and an outer…
One of Life’s Building Blocks can Form in Space
Peptides are one of the smallest biomolecules and are one of life's critical building blocks. New research shows that they…
Curiosity Sees a Strong Carbon Signature in a Bed of Rocks
Carbon is critical to life, as far as we know. So anytime we detect a strong carbon signature somewhere like…
Did Cosmic Dust Deliver the Phosphorus Needed for Life?
Without phosphorus, there's no life. It's a necessary part of DNA, RNA, and other biological molecules like ATP, which helps…
How To Search the Chemical Makeup of Exoplanet Atmospheres for Hints at Their History
Author’s note – this article was written with Dr. Vincent Kofman, a scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), working in…
Did Asteroid Impacts Provide Both the Heat and Raw Ingredients to Enable Life?
This is our Great Question: How did life begin on Earth? Anyone who says they have the answer is telling…
The Interior of Enceladus Looks Really Great for Supporting Life
When NASA's Voyager spacecraft visited Saturn's moon Enceladus, they found a body with young, reflective, icy surface features. Some parts…
Astronomers Report They’ve Detected the Amino Acid Glycine in the Atmosphere of Venus
Does it feel like all eyes are on Venus these days? The discovery of the potential biomarker phosphine in the…