Researchers have identified a naturally occurring sugar drifting in space near the centre of the Milky Way, providing new insight into how life-sustaining compounds came to exist on Earth.

According to a study published in the journal Nature Astronomy, a team of astrochemists led by Izaskun Jiménez-Serra at the Center for Astrobiology in Spain detected erythrulose — a sugar found naturally in raspberries and used in fake tan products — in the interstellar medium, the vast expanse of dust and gas that fills the space between star systems within a galaxy.

The sugar was found in the galactic centre region of the Milky Way, approximately 26,700 light years from Earth, where gases and stars are densely concentrated.

Scientists have long puzzled over sugar's origins on Earth. While they knew it must have existed in the early cosmos — given that all life depends on it — attempts to recreate the chemical conditions that would produce it have largely failed. Several types of sugar have been detected on asteroids and meteorites, suggesting they may have arrived on Earth via space rocks during the solar system's early days, but the source of sugar before that remained unknown.

In Layman's Terms

Think of the interstellar medium as a vast cosmic cloud filled with dust and gas floating between stars. Scientists used powerful telescopes to detect the unique frequencies — essentially the chemical fingerprints — that molecules emit as they move around in this cloud. By comparing those frequencies to measurements taken in a laboratory, the team could identify which molecules were present near the galactic centre.

Laboratory experiments showed that the sugar could have formed through chemical reactions occurring in ice deep within the interstellar medium, without any life present and before stars and planets even existed. This discovery suggests that sugar — and potentially many other molecules essential to life — can naturally form in the harsh conditions of outer space.

Why This Matters

This finding helps solve a long-standing mystery about how life's building blocks came to Earth. If sugar can form naturally in space, it strengthens the theory that asteroids and comets carrying these compounds delivered them to our planet billions of years ago, seeding the conditions necessary for life to emerge. The discovery also suggests that other life-essential molecules may be similarly abundant throughout the universe, raising intriguing questions about whether the chemical ingredients for life exist elsewhere in space.

Sources: Global News