Extraterrestrial Handedness?
- 14 February 1997
- journal article
- Published by American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in Science
- Vol. 275 (5302) , 942-943
- https://doi.org/10.1126/science.275.5302.942
Abstract
Biological systems exhibit molecular handedness: During biosynthesis, predominantly L amino acids rather than D amino acids are incorporated into proteins. The origins of this handedness remain puzzling. In his Perspective, Bada discusses results reported by Cronin and Pizzarello in the same issue (p. 951 ) showing a slight excess of L amino acids in a well-known extraterrestrial object, the Murchison meteorite. This finding suggests the existence of an enrichment process in cosmochemical environments and could possibly be the source of molecular handedness on Earth.Keywords
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