Mark Kelly Says This 'Exciting' Scientific Find Raises Questions Of Life Beyond Earth

NASA said the discovery shows such "building blocks" of life are "widespread throughout the solar system."

Retired astronaut and current Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) celebrated NASA’s “pretty exciting” announcement on Thursday after the space agency highlighted how scientists found sugars essential for life on samples of a near-Earth asteroid.

While the discovery of the sugars glucose and ribose — which NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft gathered from the asteroid Bennu — did not indicate “evidence of life,” the findings show that “building blocks of biological molecules were widespread throughout the solar system,” according to NASA.

The space agency noted that the sugars deoxyribose — which wasn’t found in the samples — and ribose are key building blocks of DNA and RNA on Earth.

Yoshihiro Furukawa, a professor at Japan’s Tohoku University who led the team of researchers that made the findings, said that the discovery of ribose means “all of the components” that form RNA are present in the asteroid.

Kelly, in a clip shared on social media, said the findings spark “larger questions about life in the universe” and underscore the importance of federal funding for scientific research.