CHILE: Three miles above the sea, in the driest desert on earth, stands the world’s most powerful telescope.
Like an eye the size of Manhattan Island, it is able to peer into the furthest corners of the universe, detecting new-born planets as they emerge from gaseous cocoons and mysterious black holes that swallow stars.
In the sun-scorched region of Antofagasta in northern Chile, the Atacama Large Millimeter Array, or ALMA as the observatory is more commonly known, has had its breakthrough of the year.
Its super-strength antennas, which collectively map distant parts of the universe, have detected the molecules that gave rise to life on earth floating in a dust cloud around a distant solar system.
Known as “methyl cyanide,” the molecules found by a team of Harvard astronomers contain the vital nitrogen atom that enables organic molecules like sugars to transform into amino acids — the strands of protein in which human DNA is encoded.
Seen as the raw ingredients for life, the finding not only indicates that other parts of the universe may be fertile plains in which life may flourish, but demonstrates the vast leaps in human knowledge made possible through scientific collaboration. Just a few years ago, such a discovery would have been impossible.
“We are collecting information now in a way that wasn’t possible before,” Giorgio Siringo, an Italian scientist who works at ALMA’s base camp, told the Miami Herald.
“Science projects that would have needed years of time to be done using other radio telescopes can now be done in a few hours at ALMA.”
