"It was previously thought that the molecules that led to life could only have originated on Earth, we have shown that they could have come from space." - Louis Allamandola NASA Ames
"There have been a lot of theories about how ice chemistry could produce the amino acids in meteorites, but this is the first time anyone has shown it really works." - George Cooper NASA Ames
"It may not be that efficient, but a cloud 100 light years across makes a pretty big beaker." - Scott Sandford.
"Amino acids are literally raining down out of the sky, and if thats not a big deal then I dont know what is." - Max Bernstein SETI Institute
"All living things are made of amino acids and they do all the work." - Jason Dworkin SETI Institute
"It is the Glycine-Alanine fraction in meteorites that are deuterium enriched, so its plausible that these molecules formed in the interstellar medium" - George Cooper NASA Ames
"Of course, many of the amino acids in meteorites were made in liquid water, but it now seems likely that at least some of the smallest ones arose in space before the solar system formed." - Max Bernstein SETI Institute
"We had previously shown that the chemistry that occurs under these conditions makes a number of different types of organic compounds of biological interest," said Dr. Max Bernstein, first author and chemist at Ames and the Center for the Study of Life in the Universe at the SETI Institute, "but because of their critical role in life on Earth, we really wanted to see if amino acids were in the mix."
"A variety of amino acids have previously been detected in certain kinds of primitive meteorites," noted Dr. George Cooper of Ames. "Their presence in meteorites proves that amino acids are, in fact, made in space. However, it has generally been thought that they were produced in the solar system within asteroids, the sources of most meteorites. Our latest work suggests that at least some of the amino acids found in meteorites may predate our solar system."
"Indeed," noted Dr. Scott Sandford of Ames, "these findings are particularly intriguing because the amino acids found in meteorites do show some signatures that suggest an interstellar connection. This connection, combined with our finding that amino acids can be made in interstellar clouds suggests that the Earth may have been seeded with amino acids from space in its earliest days."
"The infall of these materials on the early Earth may have facilitated the origin of life on our planet," said Dr. Jason Dworkin of Ames and the SETI Institute. "Furthermore, since new stars and planets are formed within the same clouds in which new amino acids are being created, this probably increases the odds that life has evolved elsewhere."
"I find these results exciting because they address not only life on Earth, but its likelihood elsewhere," agreed Dr. Louis Allamandola of Ames. "The universal nature of the production of these amino acids under deep space conditions makes this of direct interest to the field of astrobiology, one of Ames core space initiatives for the 21st century."
"I am the lizard queen!" - Max Bernstein SETI Institute