John Ilee News Today

New research suggests that the ingredients for life elsewhere in the universe may be more common than we previously supposed

In a protoplanetary disc, scientists found molecules that are the precursors to the larger molecules that directly make up genetic material.

And other stories from the stranger side of life

These organic molecules resulted in life on Earth, and are 100 times more abundant than previously thought, according to research led by the University of Leeds.

Date Time Discovery of methanol in a ‘warm’ planet-forming disk Astronomers have identified the molecule methanol in the ‘warm zones’ of a protoplanetary disk circling a star about 360 light years from Earth. The finding is significant because although methanol – CH3OH – is one of the simpler complex carbon-based molecules, it is a precursor chemical involved in the creation of more complex substances such as amino acids and proteins, the building blocks of life. The methanol was id...