The space between the stars just got a little sweeter.
Astronomers have detected a type of sugar in space that is also found in raspberries and self-tanning products. This sugar, called erythruloseis located in what is known as “interstellar medium”: thin clouds of gas and dust scattered among the stars.
Sugar is not only used to sweeten tea and sprinkle donuts. The different varieties provide energy to our cells and are even part of the DNA. Scientists are eager to know how sugars are formed, as they are a key ingredient for life as we know it.
Using two dish-shaped radio telescopes located in Spain, researchers collected data from a large gas cloud near the center of the Milky Way. They identified sugar in a gaseous state by comparing telescope signals with laboratory samples. This is the latest type of sugar detected in space, in a region that NASA’s twin Voyager spacecraft have passed through, the spacecraft that have traveled the furthest from Earth.
The results were published Monday in the journal Nature Astronomy.
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Scientists have discovered interesting chemical compounds in our galaxy, including the building blocks of genetic material and the cell. About 25 years ago they detected a substance similar to table sugar near the center of the Milky Way, and black grains from the asteroid Bennu, collected by NASA’s Osiris-Rex spacecraft, revealed the presence of other sugars, including a key component of DNA.
This new sugar is not essential for life, but can easily be transformed into a form that is considered crucial for the origin of life on Earth. In addition, it is one of the most complex sugars detected so far, according to astrophysicist Erika Hamden of the University of Arizona.
“It’s a perfect example of what’s floating around in the galaxy.”said Hamden, who was not involved in the new investigation.
These interstellar investigations aim to understand how life emerged. Was it distant comets or asteroids that brought us the essential ingredients? Or were the essential components already here and, over time, gave rise to our solar system?
The new sugar supports this last theory. Researchers want to look for more sugars in space and find out how they transform into different forms.
Finding them in the same place means they are also likely hiding in remote corners of the galaxy along with other important elements, said study author Izaskun Jiménez-Serra, an astrophysicist at the Center for Astrobiology in Spain.
“Key ingredients for the origin of life could be present in other regions of the galaxywhich opens the possibility of life developing in other places in the universe,” said Jiménez-Serra.
This story was translated from English to Spanish with an artificial intelligence tool and was reviewed by an editor before publication.