By Dean Murray

Scientists have found mysterious space gum vital to creating life in an asteroid sample.

Sugars essential for biology have been discovered in a gum-like substance in fragments from the Bennu space-rock.

NASA's $800 million OSIRIS-REx mission collected rocks and dust, called regolith, from Bennu’s surface in 2020 and carried it 200 million miles back to Earth.

The substance has not been seen before in astromaterials and is among research presented in three studies published Tuesday in Nature Geoscience and Nature Astronomy .

The findings suggest that crucial ingredients for life’s chemistry were readily available on asteroids, and these building blocks of life were widespread in the early solar system .

One paper, led by Scott Sandford at NASA’s Ames Research Cent

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