A sugar key to the origins of life has been discovered in interstellar space | CNN

Astronomers have detected a natural sugar found in raspberries in clouds of interstellar dust and gas near the center of the Milky Way galaxy. The sweet discovery shows for the first time that compounds that are key to life can form in the vast expanse between stars and fuels optimism that other molecules important for the origins of life might be found in space. A team led by astronomers at Spain’s Center for Astrobiology detected the sugar, called erythrulose, which is made of four carbon atoms. Sugars play a pivotal role in living systems, helping to provide energy, build biological structures and form parts of genetic material such as RNA and DNA. To make the observations, the team used two radio telescopes, one at the Yebes Observatory north of Madrid and the other at the Institute for Radio Astronomy in the Millimeter Range, known as IRAM, in the Sierra Nevada in southern Spain, to study a molecular cloud known as G+0.693−0.027 near the center of the galaxy. Researchers identified the sugar by comparing its molecular signature in the radio wave data from the molecular cloud with the wavelength pattern for erythrulose measured in the laboratory. The team initially searched