Supernovae Might Be Directing Life's Development Throughout the Universe
A special property of Earth's organic molecules could be caused by supernovae, a new study says - suggesting that life's building blocks were created not on Earth, but elsewhere in the cosmos. Many of these building blocks, such as amino acids, sugars and other molecules, are chiral - they come in two identical forms that are mirror opposites. Human hands are the best example of chirality: They are asymmetrical mirror images of each other, so you cannot superimpose them on each other. Imagine using your left hand to shake someone's right hand. In chemistry, chirality refers to asymmetrical molecules that also cannot be superimposed on each other. They are considered right- or left-handed depending on how their atoms are arranged. On Earth, life tends to be left-handed (though a recent study suggests its lower forms can be ambidextrous). Left-handedness also seems to prevail throughout the cosmos, according to studies of meteorites. Researchers from...