Scientists discovered sugar in the Milky Way. It can help answer the cosmic mystery – National
A team of scientists has made a delicious discovery after identifying naturally occurring sugars at the heart of the Milky Way, providing a sprinkle of new insight into the origins of life on Earth.
According to research published in the journal Nature Astronomy, the discovery provides clues to the source of the life-sustaining compound and how its presence is essential to all living things.
The origin of sugar on Earth has proved a long-lasting mystery to researchers, who knew it must have existed in the early days of the cosmos, given life’s reliance on it, but their efforts to recreate the chemical conditions that would have led to its emergence have largely failed, the study said.
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Scientists believe that sugar may have been present in asteroids and comets that hit Earth in the early solar system, as several types of it have been found in asteroids and meteorites, according to the study, but the source of the chemical before that was unknown.
Now, a team of astronomers led by Izaskun Jiménez-Serra at the Astrobiology Center in Spain claims to have solved this problem after identifying erythrulose – a sugar that occurs naturally in raspberries and is used in fake tan products – drifting in what is known as the interstellar medium (ISM), the interstellar medium (ISM), the atmosphere full of star dust in space.
Sugar was discovered in the galactic center of the Milky Way – that is, near the center, where there is a concentration of gases and stars – about 26,700 light years from Earth.
The interstellar medium is “an impressive chemical factory,” the authors of this study wrote, noting that hundreds of compounds have been found there, including molecules of the origin of life that are believed to be components of RNA, the nucleic acid present in all living things.
Laboratory experiments presented in the study showed that the sugars found could have formed from chemical reactions in ice deep in the ISM.
Jiménez-Serra and his colleagues used powerful telescopes to observe the waves emitted by molecules moving in the ISM. By comparing those to similar chemical frequencies in the lab, the team was able to see which molecules were bouncing around the center of the galaxy. In this way they get erythrulose.
“It was such a great game,” Jiménez-Serra told The New York Times, “my heart started beating so hard, so fast.”
Assistant Professor Brett McGuire, an astronomer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who was not involved in the research, told American media that the team’s rigorous and extensive analysis of their findings “supports their conclusion that the molecule exists.”
“They went to extraordinary lengths to account for all possible contacts,” he said.
This study confirms that sugar can form in harsh interstellar conditions, without the existence of life and before the appearance of stars and planets, which gives more insight into how such chemicals are formed and suggests that many other molecules important for the emergence of life may exist in the celestial regions of outer space.
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