Key Molecule for Life Found in Habitable Region of the Galaxy

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A sugar molecule linked to the origin of life was discovered in a potentially habitable region of our galaxy.

The molecule, called glycolaldehyde, was spotted in a large star-forming area of space around 26,000 light-years from Earth in the less-chaotic outer regions of the Milky Way. This suggests the sugar could be common across the universe, which is good news for extraterrestrial-life seekers.

Organic chemicals are not uncommon in space. They're just carbon-water reactions. Unfortunately, those phenomena observed in the midst of space are not well preserved, as the reserves of water in space to allow for such continued reactions is often transient or sparse.

But who knows, perhaps they're the byproduct of a chemical reaction in some strange organism? Is life, including sentient life, but a peculiar quality of some giant rock, surrounded by gases, orbiting some random ball of plasma, nursed in water from carbon? Surely, some type of self organizing structure has evolved beyond the confines of such a scenario.