Scientists have found water and organic matter on the surface of an asteroid sample collected from the solar system – the first time such a substance has been found on an asteroid.
The sample, which consisted of only one grain, came from the asteroid ‘Itokawa’ with the first Hayabusa mission of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (Jaxa) in 2010.
It shows both water and organic matter from an alien world, but from the asteroid itself. Researchers from Royal Holloway, University of London, suggest that the asteroid has been evolving for billions of years by absorbing the soluble and organic matter in the same way that the Earth does.
The asteroid has been very heated, dehydrated and broken, but has been able to regenerate and rehydrate using a built-in material. The study also shows that type S asteroids – the most common ones that come to Earth – can absorb the raw parts of life.
This could rewrite our knowledge of life history on Earth, which previously focused on carbon-rich type C asteroids.
“Hayabusa’s mission was a robotic spacecraft developed by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency to return samples from a small distance near Earth called Itokawa, for detailed analysis in laboratories on Earth”, Dr Queenie Chan from the Department of Earth Sciences at Royal Holloway, said in a statement.
“Following a detailed study by an international team of researchers, our analysis of a single grain, nicknamed ‘Amazon’, has preserved primary organic material (without heating) and processing (heating). Within ten microns (thousandth of a centimeter) of distance.
“The heated organic material shows that the asteroid has previously been heated to over 600 degrees Celsius. The presence of unheated organic matter is very close, resulting in the collapse of pristine organs on the surface of Itokawa after the asteroid cooled. ”
The scientists’ research, entitled “Organic matter and water from asteroid Itokawa”, was published in the journal Scientific Reports.
“These findings are very interesting because they reveal complex details about the history of an asteroid and how its evolutionary pathway is so similar to the prebiotic world,” said Dr. Chen. .
It is hoped that the analysis of this sample will form the basis for a more detailed analysis of other samples. Jaxa Hayabusa2’s mission returned pieces of the asteroid Ryugu last year, reclaiming a piece of celestial rock that was only 38 centimeters in diameter.
In 2019, samples from the asteroid Bennu revealed that it was indeed older than scientists had previously thought, providing a new perspective on how the evolution of the Solar System evolved.
Observation of Bennu also confirmed the presence of extensive and abundant irrigation materials, as well as the remarkable presence of large boulders.