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First Sugars Found on Asteroid Bennu: Implications for Life

12/6/2025

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Summary

Story summary

A team from Tohoku University identified ribose and glucose on asteroid Bennu, the first detection of these sugars in extraterrestrial material.
The OSIRIS-REx spacecraft collected Bennu samples in 2020 and returned them to Earth in September 2023, from about 200 million miles away.
The findings imply that the building blocks of life may be common in the universe, but they do not prove extraterrestrial life.

History

Historical Context

The Hayabusa spacecraft returned samples from asteroid Itokawa in 2005, revealing organic compounds that suggested asteroids could harbor life's building blocks. This aligns with findings from NASA's OSIRIS-REx mission, which collected samples from asteroid Bennu in 2020 and returned them in 2023, indicating that sugars like ribose and glucose may be common in the cosmos, reshaping our understanding of life's potential beyond Earth.

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Story summary

A team from Tohoku University identified ribose and glucose on asteroid Bennu, the first detection of these sugars in extraterrestrial material.
The OSIRIS-REx spacecraft collected Bennu samples in 2020 and returned them to Earth in September 2023, from about 200 million miles away.
The findings imply that the building blocks of life may be common in the universe, but they do not prove extraterrestrial life.

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