First ‘true sugar’ molecule found in space — offering hints to life’s origins

Astronomers have detected a four-carbon sugar molecule in a cloud of gas and dust near the centre of our galaxy. The molecule, erythrulose, is the most complex sugar detected outside of our Solar System, the team says. If erythrulose exists in these molecular clouds, it could be transferred to passing asteroids and comets as a star system forms. Such bodies could have brought sugars — the feedstock for early versions of DNA and RNA — to Earth during a period of heavy asteroid bombardment around four billion years ago, suggests astronomer and study co-author Izaskun Jiménez-Serra.