Astronomers have made a groundbreaking discovery by detecting the presence of cell membrane molecules in space for the very first time.

Among all the conundrums as to what science is yet to unravel, the origin of life remains the most fascinating. Nature of the fact that Earth emerged around 4.5 billion years after the Sun’s creation which came from after the solar system was populated with life that required many essential molecules is the second piece of the puzzle. Where the body came from and why neither of them bothered to ask is still baffling.

The hypothesis that the primary elements of life, that is, water, primitive molecules, and nucleic acids, formed in space and were delivered to Earth by meteorites and comets maybe is one of the supported explanations. The theory indicates which are formed from the interstellar clouds made of molecular gas and dust and may contain all organic molecules required for the appearance of life.

These bricks are without a doubt seen by astronomers in some intergalatic gas clouds. Amino acids, the basic units of proteins, and, arguably, the inner life of all sentient beings come directly into their sight. Additionally, they are able to witness nucleotides’ components that encode the genetic information as a nucleotide strand.

Hence, along with the molecules with a capability of making a membrane to sheath and protect life’s molecules in a cell compartment known to us as protocells, molecules with such meitarianic properties are another significant factor for the origin of life. All world’s cells including microbes, plant and animal life have molecule called phospholipid in their membranes. Notwithstanding, people can stare at these beautiful paintings for the rest of their lives but they have never seen them in the space.Thus far.

Life’s precursors

The building block of the most basic phospholipid – ethanolamine – has been found in the Universe for the first time, a detection achieved by Vίctor Rivilla from the Spanish Astrobiology Centre in Madrid and the team. As discovered in the experiment, the interstellar medium contains all the constituent elements of life and probably everyone that doubted the possibility of life outside Earth, should now consider that dispersed in the Universe there is everything to give rise to life forms. “It is concluded that such conditions explain not only the genesis of life on Earth but also on every possible planets or satellite anywhere in the Universe in which the energy could have been available,” they say.

Referring to the examination of light from Sagittarius B2, an interstellar cloud of gas and dust of which a distance from the galaxy’s center is 390 light years, the study is conducted. It is not as the circumstance was formulated by astronomers that this area is rich in organic molecules, ice, and dust grains.

The chemical composition of ethanolamine (NH2CH2CH2OH) is conveyed in the formula above. Our cluster has designed the spectrum expected to be present in material pictured where the low-temperature scenario was taken as a fundamental assumption. Next they checked the sun’s light that remained where a cloud had existed as the proof for this spectrum which they did.

Astronomers have been able to find the chemical ethanolamine in meteorites, without hinderance from the fact that it had never been seen before in space. The question about the process of how it came here has been the subject of a quite heated discussion. Some scientists have been suggesting that it could only have arisen as a result of an exceedingly rare chain reaction on a parent asteroid.

Such recent data signifies an ecological pattern, where ethanolamine is much more abundant. On Earth the hydrophilic slight originating from phospholipid of molecules form structure that are called membranes by cells. “Ethanolamine, could have been passed to planetsesimals as well as minor bodies of the Solar System,and particularly to Earth, fromthe proto-Solar nebula,” as revealed by Rivilla and his teammates, who discovered it in interstellar clouds. It would possibly have led to an instability which formed cells in prebiotic soup from which our late predecessors came.

Radical notion

A theory of an even more radical nature is that interstellar amines like ethanolamine mixing in primordial conditions may have triggered the origin of protocell systems. Besides some of the primordial elements, which would have been encapsulated automatically, for instance water and amino acids, this structure is as well enriched with other more prebiotic components. The result of our work would be prebiotic goo in melting pots that can be used as seeds to any planet, with a glimpse of at the faint cosmic body passing by.

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