How simple chemistry led to complex living organisms in space

Ten years ago , the European Space Agency’s Rosetta probe pulled up alongside a comet called 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko .

Scientists sought hints about how our solar system came to be and about the origin of one class of molecules in particular.

The Rosetta mission and others have shown just how ubiquitous organic molecules are in space.

The James Webb Space Telescope observed a young galaxy 1.5 billion years after the Big Bang .

Organic molecules likely formed in the twilight years of the earliest stars, perhaps as early as a few hundred million years after their birth.

To date, scientists have detected more than 200 kinds of organic molecules in interstellar space.

The key question is whether these molecules can survive the birth of a solar system.

In 2024 a team of scientists published initial results of computer models showing that complex organics can form rapidly in protoplanetary disks.

The molecules assemble in the same “dust traps” where planetesimals, the asteroid-size building blocks of planets, coalesce.

Understanding how organics form in space and end up on planets might give us a better idea of whether life has arisen on other worlds.