Nearly a hundred different types of amino acids have been observed in meteorites, but only a dozen of the 20 that are essential for life have been found. Biological amino acids also have a peculiarity that gives them away: They all have a “left-handed” structure, whereas abiotic processes create left- and right-handed molecules in equal measure. Several meteorites discovered on Earth have an excess of left-handed amino acids, Dworkin says—the only non-biological system ever observed with this imbalance.
For this experiment, the team tested the theory that amino acids were first created within interstellar molecular clouds, then rode to Earth inside asteroids. They decided to recreate the conditions these molecules
→ Continue reading at Wired - Science