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Space Sugar Discovered In Binary System Star
SchrodingerZ writes "Sweet tooths rejoice! 400 light years from Earth in the constellation Ophiuchus, sugar molecules have been confirmed in a gas cloud surrounding a young star. The star, IRAS 16293-2422, though early in its life is relativity close to the size of our Sun. It is part of a Binary star system. '"In the disk of gas and dust surrounding this newly formed star, we found glycolaldehyde, which is a simple form of sugar, not much different to the sugar we put in coffee," study lead author Jes Jorgensen, of the Niels Bohr Institute in Denmark, said in a statement.' Glycolaldehyde has been found before in space, but never this close to a Sun-like planet. In fact 'the molecules are about the same distance away from the star as the planet Uranus is from our sun.' This discovery proves that the building blocks of life could have possibly existed in the earlier parts of our own solar system. This particular sugar reacts with propenal to form ribose, which is a major component for organic life on Earth."
The creationists will need something to sugar the pill.
Ezekiel 23:20
If the submitter had actually read the article, he'd know that while the molecules in question *are* sugar, they *are not* sweet and in fact are arguably not even saccharides.
I love hauler spawns.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
I feed my bacteria in the lab plenty of artificially synthesised compounds and they don't give a damn. Based on life as we know it, if it's availabe and it can use it then life will usually find some way of taking it up regardless of source.
The better question is do the chemicals react to form ribose under the conditions in space, or can they survive the transfer to somewhere they will react?
It is worth noting that this effect does actually happen to some degree. For example, the radio telescope array that they use, includes a great deal of computing power for controlling the system and signal and image processing. That technology didn't need to be independently developed from scratch.
As to cost, that system apparently costs more than a billion dollars. But I doubt that the system would have been the same order of magnitude, should one have developed it in 1970 (with the same capabilities as the current one) instead of now. Similarly, I imagine we'll find that computing technology and manufacture/construction would have advanced in the next twenty years to make the project somewhat easier and cheaper to do twenty years from now.
The real issue to such things is that there is a time value to research and development. Doing and learning things now does have greater value than doing those things twenty years from now.
...your average Brit, sitting there sipping his coffee or tea, listening to BBC morning news...
"And we interrupt this program to bring you the following news: A huge lump of sugar is headed towards planet earth, yes...that is where you and I live".
The unassuming average Brit, just sitting there, sipping on his morning coffee when he yet again is interrupted by a voice saying: "More sugar dear?" ...you all know where I am going with this.
What this world is coming to - is for you and me to decide.
If there's sugar, someone will surely make rum out of it. We'll have plenty of space grog. Arrr!
I hadn't known there were so many idiots in the world until I started using the Internet -Stanislaw Lem
Yeah, but the propenal reaction is not exactly how "life" does it.
Especially when it's not "life" yet. Got it?
Upward mobility is a slippery slope - the higher you climb the more you show your ass.
Just need some yeast and we'll have one hell of a party star!
Everybody uses broad generalizations.
A sugar molecule is as far from an amoeba as a piece of quartz frim a supercomputer. Insisting that living things came from nonliving matter by random processes is absurd. Anyone who thinks that is being far more dogmatic than the creationists they stubbornly ridicule.
Where to start...
Amino acids are found in deep space, not exactly a prime spot for the development of life.
We know that living things came from nonliving matter (and energy), because the universe was once in a state where living matter could not exist, yet now living matter is rife in at least one place.
The universe and its processes are not entirely random. If they were, this sugar would not exist either.
It's the very opposite of "dogmatic" to base your views on evidence.
Yours might have been an OK troll the first day the internet existed, but now it's as far from "nice troll" as a sugar molecule is from an amoeba.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Ribose is an important component of RNA (and deoxy-ribose of DNA), so yeah, I'd say it's pretty central to life.
This is a rehash of a paper published in November 2008 (Beltran, et. al.). By the way, glucolaldehyde is NOT a sugar, it is a diose. Well, the only diose.
Operation Guillotine is in effect.
Glycolaldehyde is the first step in the metabolism of ethylene glycol, and likewise will be metabolized to oxalic acid, which is the poison in rhubarb.
Ooh, moderator points! Five more idjits go to Minus One Hell!
Delendae sunt RIAA, MPAA et Windoze