A small, dark and rigid space rock that touched down at the Field Museum last week could hold the answers to the origin of life in the universe, researchers say.
The rock is just a portion of a sample from asteroid Bennu collected in 2020 during NASA’s 2016 OSIRIS-REx mission. Bennu then landed on Earth in 2023. It is the third asteroid sample to reach Earth and first in the U.S.
Although it is very small, it’s full of information and rich in organic compounds, according to Philipp Heck, the Robert A. Pritzker Curator of Meteoritics and Polar Studies Senior Director of the Negaunee Integrative Research Center at the Field Museum.
“This is a huge boulder for us, and by studying it, we can learn something about the origin of the solar system, the ingredients that went into the formation of life, of Earth, and this is really exciting,” Heck said.
An estimated 4.6-billion-year-old asteroid orbiting at a relative proximity to Earth, Bennu makes for the perfect asteroid to study, Heck said. The asteroid also hasn’t changed much over the past 4.6 billion years, and the sample collected was completely uncontaminated by materials on Earth like rain, humidity and microbes. Heck called it a “time capsule” that could reveal organic minerals that existed at the start of the solar system that eventually developed into life.
“We’re looking at the earliest time of the solar system, and that’s why the sample is important. The Earth comes from the same material, but Earth has gone through so many geological processes, plate tectonics, volcanoes, erosion that changed those materials,” Heck said. “The rocks from asteroid Bennu didn’t experience any of that. Once it formed, it stayed.”
Although it is very small, the sample from asteroid Bennu is full of information and rich in organic compounds, according to Philipp Heck, the Robert A. Pritzker Curator of Meteoritics and Polar Studies Senior Director of the Negaunee Integrative Research Center at the Field Museum.
Victor Hilitski/For the Sun-Times
Previous studies of rock and dust from Bennu found compounds that are key to life and revealed the history of saltwater, which NASA states could have served as the “broth” compounds that combined to create life.
At the Field Museum, the focus of research on the sample will be to look at the smell of the rock that could come from volatile organic compounds present. Those are very small molecules in the asteroid that can be easily lost through vaporization. Because this asteroid sample was preserved so well, the team believes they will be able to study those compounds.
“This aspect has been completely understudied, and it may play an important role in our origin in the formation of life,” Heck said.
The team has not touched the sample and likely won’t for about two more months as they prepare and practice their procedure with other materials to minimize any risk of mistakes.
Yuke Zheng, a University of Chicago Ph.D. candidate, resident graduate student at the Field Museum and member of the OSIRIS-REx Sample Analysis Team, has been working on this research for two years and over 20 meteorite samples. She said this asteroid sample is the last puzzle piece.
“Each meteorite is kind of different but also have some similarities. They are each a piece of the puzzle that I’m trying to put together, and Bennu is the last and the most important one,” Zheng said.
Yuke Zheng, a University of Chicago resident graduate student at the Field Museum, has been working on this research for two years. “Each meteorite is kind of different but also have some similarities. They are each a piece of the puzzle that I’m trying to put together, and Bannu is the last and the most important one,” Zheng said.
Victor Hilitski/For the Sun-Times
Heck said this asteroid has the ingredients from which life and humans come, and it is important to have the curiosity to find the answer.
“We are really physically related to that sample. This is our ancestor, essentially, in nature, from which we formed, so why not study?” Heck said. “This is a fundamental question for humanity to be able to address. … It’s fascinating.”