Asteroid life

NASA Discovers Building Blocks of Life on Asteroid Bennu

In a stunning breakthrough, NASA has confirmed that samples returned from the near-Earth asteroid Bennu contain all five nucleobases — the essential ingredients of DNA and RNA. This discovery, announced in late March 2025, marks a monumental step forward in our understanding of the origins of life in the universe.

The OSIRIS-REx mission, which collected and returned samples from Bennu, has provided scientists with a rare window into the chemistry of the early solar system. Within the dust and rock fragments, researchers identified adenine, guanine, cytosine, thymine, and uracil — molecules that form the genetic code of every living organism on Earth. Alongside these, the samples also revealed signs of brine and minerals that form only in the presence of liquid water.

These findings suggest that Bennu, or the body it originated from, once harbored water and facilitated prebiotic chemistry — the kind that could eventually lead to life. More importantly, it supports the long-standing hypothesis that key ingredients for life were delivered to early Earth by asteroids and comets.

The discovery is not only a triumph for planetary science and astrobiology, but also for the future of space exploration. It reinforces the idea that life may not be unique to Earth and that the seeds of biology might be scattered throughout the cosmos.

As analysis of the Bennu samples continues, scientists hope to uncover even more about the complex organic molecules preserved on the asteroid. Each new finding brings us one step closer to answering one of the most profound questions of all: how did life begin?

Read more on NASA’s official OSIRIS-REx page.