IT is important to understand the chemical inventory that was available to the primordial life from which life originated, as well as the potential molecular reservoir that might be accessible to other Solar Systems in order to determine likely regions where complex chemistry, or even life could exist elsewhere. Meteorites, in particular the 4% of carbonaceous chondrites that fall to the Earth, represent some of the most primitive and unaltered bodies in the solar system that we are able to study, and represent the primordial matter that formed our own Solar System. Moreover, they could have been an extraterrestrial source, and major contributor to the organic species available on the prebiotic Earth. Of particular interest is the presence of amino acids and related compounds which could have yielded active length peptides within the primordial environment either directly or by production within the heated environment. The amino acids and associated species are found to be in high abundance within certain types of carbonaceous chondrites (specifically CM2 and CR2 groups), presenting an opportunity to try to answer some key questions, such as: i) Are amino acids incorporated into meteorites or formed within them? ii) To what extent are these species present as free acids vs. polymeric forms within the meteorite? iii) Are there spatial associations between acids or polymer abundances with the mineral/metal components found within meteorites? And iv) Does the temperature and history of the meteorite parent body play a role in their abundances and play a role in their production/destruction mechanisms? Here, we present some recent work investigating the process of the polymerization process on mineral surfaces as well as looking for evidences of these processes by looking at the Murchison (CM2), Allende (CV3), Jbilet Winselwan (CM2), and Tagish Lake (C2?) meteorites. A correlated approach is outlined whereby techniques including Raman and FTIR microscopy, TEM, ToF-SIMS, and some preliminary work using 3D tomography, ESI-MS, DART-ToF and nanoIR are helping to shed light on some of these questions.

Extraterrestrial contributions to the prebiotic inventory of the early earth from meteorites

2019 Spring National Meeting

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