Two science teams pored over samples from the B-type asteroid Bennu, finding chemicals linked to the beginnings of life and brine that is of interest for future space exploration.

Asteroid Bennu seems to have come from a long-lost world on the fringes of the solar system, where saltwater pooled and dried over thousands of years and life’s basic ingredients were widespread.

Samples contain all five nucleobases of DNA and RNA, supporting theory that asteroids may have seeded Earth with life's essential ingredients.

The study of asteroid samples is a highly lucrative area of research and one of the best ways to determine how the Solar System came to be. Given that asteroids are leftover material from the formation of the Solar System,

Analyzing a sample from an asteroid named Bennu reveals the chemicals necessary to form DNA and RNA.

Rock and dust samples brought back from the near-Earth asteroid Bennu contain organic matter, including amino acids and all five DNA and RNA bases, as well as salts that formed early in the history of Bennu's parent body.

Japanese collaborators detected all five nucleobases — building blocks of DNA and RNA — in samples returned ... 121.6 grams of sample from asteroid (101955) Bennu in September 2023—the ...

Joint Press Release by Hokkaido University, Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC), Kyushu University, Tohoku University, and

Japanese collaborators detected all five nucleobases — building blocks of DNA and RNA — in samples returned from asteroid Bennu by NASA's OSIRIS-REx

Samples from NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission show the asteroid Bennu had organic molecules and minerals and possibly salty water and other life ingredients.

When exposed to formaldehyde, which was also detected, ammonia can form amino acids, the building blocks of proteins. According to the study in Nature Astronom y, the team also found 14 of the 20 amino acids present in Earth-bound life in the Bennu sample. In addition, Bennu contains all five of the nucleotide bases present in DNA and RNA.