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Apr 22, 2009 05:20 PM | 22
Two of the most complex molecules ever found outside the solar system have been turned up by astronomers peering into Sagittarius B2 (Sgr B2), a massive, vigorous star-forming region near the heart of the Milky Way.
Arnaud Belloche, an astronomer at the Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy in Bonn, Germany, and his colleagues detected the spectral signature of ethyl formate (far left in image) and n-propyl cyanide (at right in image) in electromagnetic radiation from Sgr B2. Both are relatively large organic (carbon-based) molecules—ethyl formate (C2H5OCHO) has 11 atoms and n-propyl cyanide (n-C3H7CN) has 12. Only cyanodecapentayne (HC11N), discovered in 1997, boasts more atoms among known interstellar molecules with 13.
Belloche and his co-authors suspect that the organics formed piecemeal on dust grains in the interstellar medium from pre-made building blocks. The mechanism could produce even more complex molecules, such as the amino acids that form proteins on Earth, but the signatures of such organics have yet to be found.
The researchers used the IRAM 30-meter telescope on Pico Veleta in southern Spain, near the city of Granada, which detects emissions in the millimeter regime—short-wavelength radio waves. Their results were presented this week at the European Week of Astronomy and Space Science at the University of Hertfordshire in England and are in press at the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.
Sgr B2 has been a gold mine of organic compounds—the authors report that most complex molecules so far turned up in interstellar space were first discovered in a hot, dense cloud in the region called the "Large Molecule Heimat," which is where the new research revealed ethyl formate and n-propyl cyanide.
In an interview with the Guardian, Belloche noted that ethyl formate is present in raspberries. The chemical "does happen to give raspberries their flavour," Belloche told the newspaper, "but there are many other molecules that are needed to make space raspberries." At the very least, perhaps ethyl formate makes space smell nice—according to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, the chemical has "a pleasant, fruity odor."
Molecules (hydrogen: white; carbon: gray; oxygen: red; nitrogen: blue): Oliver Baum, University of Cologne
Tags:
interstellar chemistry,
millimeter astronomy,
radio astronomy,
interstellar space
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22 Comments
Add CommentWow. 1, at the obvious awesomeness of the discovery, and 2. the amazingness of being able to look back in time, at individual molecules, across the galaxy, and actually get factual data from what you see.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAbsolutely awesome.
Organic matter should be abundant in space. Life has developed before on other planets, some of these would have been destroyed by asteroid impact spreading organic matter across space.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOur own planet must leave behind a trail of atmospheric gasses and organic matter especially after an asteroid impact.
Evolution favours intelligent species. Intelligent species tend to destroy the environment that sustains them and bring on their extinction. As on earth before their extinction they may put organics into the space surrounding their planet that can migrate into outer space.
Earthling, I would add some IFs before life developing on other planets and evolution favouring intelligence. Your second sentence in the last paragraph if true, seems to disprove the prior sentence or, if false, suggests that we are just not that intelligent. I'm with you on that one.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think the supposition in this article is not that organics in space are sprayed around from Earth or other life bearing planets, but that complex organics actually form there. This can lead to the conjecture that maybe life here started up there and if true, would hugely improve the likelihood of life forming elsewhere. If all planets swim in a soup of potentially-life forming molecules then chances are good that if we seek out planets with water bearing environments we'll come across some of it.
This is cool stuff. While highly UNLIKELY, does anyone else ponder the possibility of fully functioning life evolving in space itself? Not as far as one of those Farscape ships, but perhaps something. That would be pretty darn cool. Of course, then we have all sorts of scenarios to weed through in regards to abiogenesis!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou seem to be confusing the cause in effect. Organic molecules are called that because they are what life on earth is formed from. There is no other reason. Life probably formed from organic molecules because they were so abundant here, not the other way around. (Life did not form organic molecules) Organic molecules have been recreated from elemental precursors via natural processes in a lab environment.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn 1953, Stanley Miller and Howard Urey performed a classic experiment in which they circulated methane, ammonia, water vapor, and hydrogen gas in a closed environment and passed electric sparks through it. After several days, they discovered that complex compounds of carbon had formed in the mixture. Their experiments indicated that in the primitive earth atmosphere, complex organic molecules could form, including amino acids, carbohydrates, and nucleic acids. The theory they expressed is the primordial soup theory.
Recent theories about the origin of organic molecules suggest that these molecules may have formed in hydrothermal vents deep in the oceans, where hot gases and elements emerge from cracks in the earth's crust. Living organisms have been found near these vents, lending credence to the theory.
Arnaud Belloche believes that these processes actually occurred in space and not on primordial earth and that is were life originated. Although I agree this is possible, I believe that most of the current chemistry on earth was created here. But it does lead to the curious possibility that the existing primordial soup of earth could have been further seeded by a more complex RNA type molecule from space to jump start the process of creating more complex organics.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSCIENTISTS ACTUALLY FIND GOD IN THE HEAVENS!!!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisJesus Christ it's true!
...Bible History all makes sense now...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=61JHQT9Y1ys
Rwilliston. No I dont want the Ifs, have done that for too long, time to make up my mind and statistic indicate there must be other life out there now and before ours began too.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLook at evolution on our planet; we have become the dominant species by virtue of the fact that we use our brains a bit more than the other species, allowing me to conclude evolution favoured us because we are a bit smarter. Now look what we are doing to our planet, we have brought on the sixth extinction. Obviously smarter species favoured by evolution bring on extinction. Remember I use smarter in a comparative sense.
If sputnik had not fallen back to earth, we would even have a dead dog is space, what about all the bacteria and viruses on all our little toys heading beyond our solar system. Time is of consequence to us living things, not an issue with the rest of the universe.
Love to get smart responses to the wild gyrations of my cranial cells. They are getting a bit tardy with age dont expect to come up with any brilliant hypothesis that only happens before wisdom begins to set in.
Just because we can't explain something -doesn't mean it isn't. If molecules found in Earths biogenesis appear elsewhere -we might be suspicious of their origins -but one thing is clear -that's the evolution of matter taking place -from a simple to a complex, composite form -just like life. And in a conducive environment life continues in it's communal journey into complexity and codependency. why should we not know that an environment conducive to production of organic molecules on a large scale is a continuum to organic life.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thissimply -not only are the origins of life a mystery -but life itself that we have today is a mystery. Noone yet has defined LIFE. The Quick and the Dead.
Yet , HERE IT IS! Most naturally from a view based in science -and the wide distribution on earth of Life Sustaining environments -organic complexity and life are a continuum depending on the conditions -which are as broad as the bonding parameters of carbon itself.
where there is complexity in carbon molecules -life is not a step away -it's on it's way. CARBON MOLECULES AND LIFE ARE A CONTINUUM.
If you read my last comment -you will understand life and carbon as a continuum. we also have other elements that grows in complexity. silicon is experiencing tremendous growth in complexity and co-dependence in our world -and why should Man's Hand be necessary. lot's of minerals are self organizing together and create beautiful Gems and Jewels and Vistas. they are complex by their naturally occuring structure. could silicon and other elements of complex forms also be a continuum with a life of their own?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMany civilizations have seen mountains and jewels as having an inner fire -life. Lay Lines and diamonds and such. maybe in space this is what 's going on -and we're just riding it's back.
Maybe, as conditions change -the carbon molecules come to a region in time of ferment -in which the situation is ideal for carbon to move into a viable complexity -there after, as on Earth -carbon complexity creates it's own environment to mature into a perfect medium for for sustaining ecology and life. And life's growing carbon complexity
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think this is carbons nature -carbon is an opportunist.
we already know that life on earth relates to organic molecules. we, as humans, are in a sense created of star dust. We are made from the same stuff in stars. I have no doubt that we wont find even more.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLife is still a mystery and will remain one. We can go through ifs ands and butts all day, which science tends to do, but organic complexity and life are a continuum depending on the conditions -which are as broad as the bonding parameters of carbon itself.
Change is the fundamental of reality -if there are complex carbon molecules -why not in the great circle of time -the conditions will meet the region -not vice-verse. that is what I am saying. A continuum is a mental structure -and as i said -what life is and how it begins remains a mystery -we must accept life is innate in carbon and as you say12, only requires conditions as broad as allow carbons bonding potential -the complexity depends on these conditions and as we know on our earth -carbon creates more perfect conditions -it evolves a system. Life Web.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEvolution doe not favour intelligence..it favours survival. Dinosaurs were not exactly intellectuals but they lived very successfully on the planet for fifty million years give or take a few hundred millennia. It is highly unlikely at the rate we naked apes are modifying the planet, that we will make it another ten centuries never mind a million years so I would say, evolution favours the steady and the non intrusive...say, like Periplaneta americana also known as the common cockroach. On other planets as well on this one, there are huge and unknown possibilities for life. The Earth shows in its history and within its varied ecology, all sorts of lifetorms that are not directly related to our antecedents. Life happens, Life starts. Life ends. Life evolves sometimes. Sometimes it does not. Planets form. Planets are burnt to a cinder. That is the Universe. There is no centre nor purpose in it. It simply..is. Enjoy your termporary awareness of its majesty.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEvolution doe not favour intelligence..it favours survival. Dinosaurs were not exactly intellectuals but they lived very successfully on the planet for fifty million years give or take a few hundred millennia. It is highly unlikely at the rate we naked apes are modifying the planet, that we will make it another ten centuries never mind a million years so I would say, evolution favours the steady and the non intrusive...say, like Periplaneta americana also known as the common cockroach. On other planets as well on this one, there are huge and unknown possibilities for life. The Earth shows in its history and within its varied ecology, all sorts of lifetorms that are not directly related to our antecedents. Life happens, Life starts. Life ends. Life evolves sometimes. Sometimes it does not. Planets form. Planets are burnt to a cinder. That is the Universe. There is no centre nor purpose in it. It simply..is. Enjoy your termporary awareness of its majesty.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEvolution doe not favour intelligence..it favours survival. Dinosaurs were not exactly intellectuals but they lived very successfully on the planet for fifty million years give or take a few hundred millennia. It is highly unlikely at the rate we naked apes are modifying the planet, that we will make it another ten centuries never mind a million years so I would say, evolution favours the steady and the non intrusive...say, like Periplaneta americana also known as the common cockroach. On other planets as well on this one, there are huge and unknown possibilities for life. The Earth shows in its history and within its varied ecology, all sorts of lifetorms that are not directly related to our antecedents. Life happens, Life starts. Life ends. Life evolves sometimes. Sometimes it does not. Planets form. Planets are burnt to a cinder. That is the Universe. There is no centre nor purpose in it. It simply..is. Enjoy your termporary awareness of its majesty.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHow many light years away is this set of complex molecules? Maybe if we viewed our part of the galaxy that long ago, this is what we'd see. I wonder what is in the Sagittarius B2 (Sgr B2) region of space right now?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIs Potential and Causation. these are fundamentals of Matter and energy. Nothing is random or accidental. especially Nothing Isn't.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thiswhich comes first -Intelligence forming habits -or intelligence forming habits.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBesides popular evolutionary theory has no theory of which comes first -i think anyone would say the lifestyle has to come first, perfecting the mind.
but not all creatures have the advantage of a lifestyle that would produce higher intelligence -they're stuck in a rut. but if habits are the source of intelligence -my bet is intelligence is a prime out come of genetic variation -one that profits more then speed agility and ferocity.
Ooh! I wish someone would write in who knows about organic chemistry and could tell us what conditions , if any, would produce complex carbons in Space. Organic -not my best subject~
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHere though -what are the basic life processes (different in some of the more primitive bacteria) . what are the processes and what are their organismic constituencies and requirements. I think all these can be traced back to the individual potential in each individual element of life -and the potential in them for forming ,together, a living organism.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisnfiertel:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLook around you, homo sapiens have become the predominant species on this planet in our size grouping as a result of our intelligence. I do not see evolution as a god like being, it is just the way things work. We have become the predominant species because we use intelligence so evolution favours intelligence.
Yes I am aware it is for a short time. Yes we have in the process brought on the sixth extinction. Yes there is no purpose to life. Yes our planet will be a cold lifeless mass some time in the future, but in the shorter term, life shapes this planet, evolution favours survivors, intelligent species survive better than others.
Periplaneta americana is one of the longest surviving and best evolved species on this planet, but we do squash them every now and then.
Thinking gives me pleasure, and for the short time I exist I will indulge in this pleasure.