James Webb explores space ice to understand the origin of life and stars

James Webb that space telescope that gave us so much exciting news in 2022, the new year is off to a strong start. After other investigations, this time he helped analyze colder molecular cloud ices that have ever been studied. In addition, even new data on the elements necessary for origin of life.

This is due to the fact that some of the elements discovered by James Webb in the specified cloud are precisely the components necessary for prepare life. This does not necessarily mean that all places where they are present have life. But at least there is parts that help build it.

In addition, since molecular clouds are excellent nurseries for stars, ice analysis can provide very useful information about the birth of these celestial objects. There is a lot of data provided by this new study by James Webb, which has just been published in a journal study. astronomy of nature.

What is a molecular cloud?

A molecular cloud is a large region within a galaxy in which matter is abundant. tight and cold so what could be diatomic hydrogen. These are interesting regions, because when there is gravitational instability in them the birth of stars can be provoked.

Just when the latter occurs, the ice in the molecular cloud sublimates. That is, it changes from a solid state to a gaseous state. Therefore, it is something ephemeral and difficult to observe. Or at least it has been so far. And this is what James Webb managed to find ice colder measured so far in the molecular cloud and perform an analysis of the elements it contains. This is much more than diatomic hydrogen.

Orion Molecular Cloud A. This is not the same cloud that James Webb studied. Credit: ESO/VISION survey.

James Webb and the origin of life

Thanks to James Webb, it was possible to detect both complex molecules and simple elements in ice. The first group includes frozen ammonia, methane, methanol and carbonyl sulfide. As for simple elements, they stand out carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen and sulfur. These, often grouped into a word made up of their chemical symbols, HONS, are what are known as the ingredients for the origin of life.

It is important to consider that the presence of all of them is not an indicator of life as such. Using the analogue of the ingredients, we can have flour, egg, yeast and butter. However, individually they do not make a cake. And they may never get together to cook it.

Nevertheless, this discovery by James Webb is very interesting because it provides a different starting point for studying the origin of life and stars. Moreover, as explained IFLScience one of the authors of the study, Will Rocha“The identification of complex organic molecules such as methanol and potentially ethanol also suggests that many of the stellar and planetary systems that develop in this particular cloud will inherit molecules in quite developed chemical state“.

While this is unknown information, and “may mean that the presence of predecessors prebiotic molecules in planetary systems, this is a normal result of star formation, not a unique feature of our solar system.”

In short, this time “James Webb” entered the coldest and deepest ice to help us better understand how life works. This is an interesting challenge.