In high enough doses, hydrogen cyanide can kill an adult human in minutes, but the chemical may be the reason why we’re here ...

Our planet is unique for its ability to sustain abundant life. From studies of the rock record, scientists believe life had already emerged on Earth at least 3.5 billion years ago and probably much ...

Scientists may have discovered a reaction that provides the “missing link” to help explain how early life formed on Earth about 4 billion years ago. All living things contain ribonucleic acid, ...

New experiments suggest RNA, life’s essential molecule, could have formed naturally on early Earth and even arrived from space, raising intriguing questions about how easily life might begin elsewhere ...

A giant impact on the early Earth could have brought the building blocks of RNA to our planet, which new research suggests could have quickly formed in the presence of compounds called borates. When ...

For decades, scientists have searched for clues to how life first emerged on Earth. Many theories focus on simple molecules reacting in water or on fragile protocells drifting in ancient seas. A new ...

This is a colored view of the C-type asteroid 162173 Ryugu, seen by the ONC-T camera on board of Hayabusa2. Filters: vwx date:2018-07-12 08:01 Image level: 2b (Images after hardware correction and ...

Tantalizing clues in 4-billion-year-old asteroid Bennu samples could reveal particular molecular formations that some ...

The question of when life began on Earth is as old as human culture. “It’s one of these fundamental human questions: When did life appear on Earth?” said Professor Martin Whitehouse of the Swedish ...