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Building Blocks of DNA Confirmed In Meteorites
MistrX writes "Researchers announced that the components of DNA have now been confirmed to exist in extraterrestrial meteorites. A different team of scientists also discovered a number of molecules linked with a vital ancient biological process, adding weight to the idea that the earliest forms of life on Earth may have been made up in part from materials delivered to Earth from space. Past research had revealed a range of building blocks of life in meteorites, such as the amino acids that make up proteins. Space rocks just like these may have been a vital source of the organic compounds that gave rise to life on Earth."
Can someone please explain the significance of this finding? I'm reading into a log of big assumptions here. So I have a few basic questions.
A.) Does that mean that life here on Earth most likely have been boot-strapped from meteorites?
B.) Such compounds are so common in the universe that finding them floating in space is trivial? Thus leading to the idea of life being more common than we think.
Life is not for the lazy.
Those would be "building blocks of any organic molecule". These are adenine and guanine, molecules of a dozen or so atoms, as well as some other molecules related to them though not found in DNA.
Actual press release with more science than TFA:
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/solarsystem/features/dna-meteorites.html