Sugars Found In Meteorites

[Richard W Travsky <rtravsky@uwyo.edu>]

Not dinos but pretty interesting. I have to wonder what life forms could
result from these amino acids and sugars.

 http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1719000/1719236.stm

Life on Earth may have got off to a sweet start nourished by sugar from
space.

The suggestion is based on the discovery of sugar in two meteorites that
are billions of years old.

Researchers from the American space agency, Nasa, say their study of the
two space rocks has revealed a range of organic substances called polyols
- the technical name for sugars.

These sugar compounds were found in the Murchison and Murray meteorites,
which are believed to be fragments broken off a much larger body.
...
It is known that meteorites contain many carbon-based compounds - such as
amino acids - that could become the building blocks of primitive life.
Analysis of the Murchison meteorite found over 90 types of amino acids.

But to date, no conclusive evidence of sugars - also crucial for life -
have been found in meteorites. Claims have been made, as far back as 1962,
but there was always the suspicion that terrestrial contamination was the
real source.

However, the Nasa researchers, writing in the journal Nature, say their
detection method is "relatively definitive". They add that as well as
sugars common on Earth, they have detected forms of sugar that are rare on
our planet.