Abiotic sugar enantiomers in the CI carbonaceous chondrite OrgueilOPEN ACCESS 

· by · in , ,

Vanessa Leyva, Manuel Robert, Raphaël Pepino, Jana Bocková & Cornelia Meinert

Nature Communications,
Published: 27 January 2026
We are providing an unedited version of this manuscript to give early access to its findings.

LINK (OPEN ACCESS)
PDF (OPEN ACCESS)

“The uneven detection of prebiotic organic compounds in meteorites—where amino acids and nucleobases are commonly identified but sugars remain rare and poorly characterized—limits our understanding of extraterrestrial organic chemistry. This discrepancy is striking given that laboratory simulations of interstellar ice chemistry readily produce complex sugars. Here we report the simultaneous analysis of sugar and amino acid enantiomers in a meteorite sample. Multiple aldoses were detected in the Orgueil meteorite, including ribose, arabinose, xylose, lyxose, and the ketopentose ribulose, several of which display near-racemic distributions consistent with an extraterrestrial origin. Recovery experiments demonstrate that sugar abundances are severely underestimated. Despite this limitation, pentose abundances are comparable to those of some C4–C5 amino acid enantiomers, implying higher true concentrations. These results indicate efficient abiotic sugar formation in space and suggest that meteorites may have delivered a broader range of prebiotically relevant sugars to early Earth than previously recognized.”

Related posts (automatically generated):

  1. Abiotic sugars in (162173) Ryugu and the primitive CI carbonaceous chondrite OrgueilOPEN ACCESS 
  2. Samples returned from the asteroid Ryugu are similar to Ivuna-type carbonaceous meteoritesOPEN ACCESS 
  3. Aqueous breakdown of aspartate and glutamate to n-ω-amino acids on the parent bodies of carbonaceous chondrites and asteroid RyuguOPEN ACCESS 
  4. Position-specific carbon isotopes of Murchison amino acids elucidate extraterrestrial abiotic organic synthesis networksOPEN ACCESS 
  5. Abiotic Synthesis of Organic Matter in Aqueous Environments Simulating Parent Bodies of Meteorites and the Effects of Minerals on the Production of Amino Acids
  6. On the origin and evolution of the asteroid Ryugu: A comprehensive geochemical perspectiveOPEN ACCESS 
  7. Extraterrestrial Amino Acids and Amines Identified in Asteroid Ryugu Samples Returned by the Hayabusa2 Mission
  8. Revisiting the CY (Yamato) Carbonaceous Chondrite Group
  9. A carbonaceous chondrite and cometary origin for icy moons of Jupiter and Saturn
  10. The first meteoritic ammonium mineral: Discovery of boussingaultite in the Orgueil CI1 carbonaceous chondriteOPEN ACCESS 
Tags: , , , , ,