[PLS] Angel Mojarro (NASA Goddard)

“Organic Matter in the Solar System: Insights from Bennu Sample Analysis”

A longstanding question regarding the formation and evolution of the solar system concerns the potential sources and diversity of complex organic compounds that may have contributed to the origins of life on the early Earth and perhaps elsewhere. One possibility is that exogenous delivery of organics synthesized within the early solar nebula may represent the most significant source of prebiotically relevant materials (e.g., amino acids, sugars, nucleobases). Therefore, organic-rich asteroids and comets that have persisted with minimal alteration since their accretion may serve as time capsules of the primordial solar system to better understand our planetary and prebiotic origins. This is one of the reasons that NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission collected materials from the rare B-type carbonaceous asteroid Bennu, which were delivered to Earth on September 24th, 2023. We anticipate that this will enable an unprecedented study of remarkably ‘pristine’ samples from a well-characterized parent body to unlock the earliest stages of cosmochemistry.

Planetary Lunch Seminar —

Colloquia topics span the range of research interests of the department’s planetary sciences research program, and the talks are intended to appeal to any graduate students, postdocs, research scientists, and faculty with a background in planetary science. Speakers include members of the MIT community and visitors.

Contact: planetary-org@mit.edu