Scientists poring over a sample brought back from the asteroid Bennu have detected amino acids and complex mineral compounds, ...

Samples from the asteroid Bennu, brought back by the OSIRIS-REx mission, reveal key molecules for life. These discoveries ...

Scientists have detected organic compounds and minerals necessary for life in the samples collected by the OSIRIS-REx mission ...

Rock and dust samples retrieved by NASA from the asteroid Bennu exhibit some of the chemical building blocks of life, ...

Samples contain all five nucleobases of DNA and RNA, supporting theory that asteroids may have seeded Earth with life's ...

Two new papers describe hints to a brine-filled environment on the 4.5-billion-year-old space rock and the presence of amino ...

The Bennu discovery helps to illuminate how, early in the Solar System’s history, asteroids and other planetary building blocks were not just “lumps of stone and ice, but active ‘living’ objects”, ...

Two science teams pored over samples from the B-type asteroid Bennu, finding chemicals linked to the beginnings of life and ...

Samples from the asteroid Bennu contain the building blocks of life as we know it. Scientists are enthusiastic.

In October 2020, a van-sized robotic spacecraft briefly touched down on the surface of Bennu, a 525-meter-wide asteroid 320 million kilometers from Earth.

When exposed to formaldehyde, which was also detected, ammonia can form amino acids, the building blocks of proteins.