© NASA, ESA, THE HUBBLE HERITAGE TEAM (STSCI/AURA) Comets like the ISON are able to generate amino acids when striking moons and planets© NASA, ESA, THE HUBBLE HERITAGE TEAM (STSCI/AURA)
The collision between an ice comet and a rocky planet like the Earth may, in primitive environments, have generated the first amino acids, the building blocks of protein. In the same way, the impact of a rock comet on a frozen surface like that of Enceladus, one of Saturn’s moons, or Europa, one of Jupiter’s moons, could be capable of producing amino acids. The collision would only need to release a significant amount of energy in an environment of appropriate composition. In laboratory tests, researchers from England and the United Sates have demonstrated that the energy released by the collision of a celestial body is enough to transform molecules, such as those in water, carbon dioxide and nitrogen, into other more complex molecules such as amino acids. At the University of Kent, in England, Zita Martins and Mark Price used special equipment to shoot a projectile at a speed of over 25,000 km per hour against a block of ice similar in composition to comets. In doing so, they obtained amino acids like alanine (Nature Geoscience, September 15, 2013). The researchers say that the mechanism could have generated complex organic molecules on Earth between 4.5 and 3.8 billion years ago. “The study showed that the basic building blocks of life can appear anywhere in the solar system or beyond,” said Zita in a press release. “That’s the first step on the way to forming life,” concluded Price.
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