That sample is now helping scientists determine quite a few things about Bennu and its fellow asteroids. So far, we've learned that it is a "rubble pile"-type asteroid rather than a solid body, and ...

The OSIRIS-REx mission returned to the sample to Earth in September of 2023, and these studies show that it contains amino acids, nucleobases, and minerals known as evaporites—all elements of life’s ...

The wealth of complex chemistry, including the chemical components necessary for life, make the Bennu samples a powerful tool for investigating how life arose. "Data from OSIRIS-REx adds major ...

Some of these types of molecules are the building blocks for life. This combination of rock, water and organics is one reason OSIRIS-REx chose to sample the organic-rich asteroid Bennu ...

The findings “bolster the hypothesis that asteroids like Bennu could have delivered the raw ingredients to Earth prior to the emergence of life,” Dan Glavin of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center tells ...

A big question in the origin of life on Earth is why it is based solely on "left-handed" amino acids. Studies on asteroid Bennu's chemical building blocks deepens the mystery. Credit: Christoph ...

New research backs up the old hypothesis that the key ingredients for life may have come to Earth on an asteroid billions of years ago. A modern case in point: The asteroid Bennu contains all the ...

“Asteroids provide a time capsule into our home planet’s history, and Bennu’s samples are pivotal in our understanding of what ingredients in our solar system existed before life started on ...

Bennu, a rocky object classified as a near-Earth asteroid, has a one-in-2,700 chance of colliding with Earth, a study has ...

Additionally, researchers uncovered salts in the Bennu cache and minerals crucial to life, including some never before seen in asteroid samples. “This is all very exciting because it suggests ...

Science correspondent Allan Blackman joins Kathryn to talk about what samples of the asteroid Bennu reveal about the building ...