Researchers tested a new electrical sensor for detecting molecular handedness on real-world samples, including the Murchison meteorite and soil from Diego de Almagro and north of Antofagasta in Chile's Atacama Desert. When they compared the sensor's readings against the established method, liquid chromatography, the results showed mixed agreement rather than a clean match, though the sensor could still detect when an imbalance between left and right-handed molecules was present. The hosts frame this as a meaningful first attempt published in Nature Communications, useful for showing where the method needs refinement even though it did not match the reference technique well.
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The hosts note that negative or mixed results are underpublished in science generally, and argue journals should encourage researchers to publish them because they help map out what doesn't work.
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Meteorites like Murchison can be contaminated by Earth-based amino acids after landing, making it hard to know if detected molecules are truly extraterrestrial.
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The hosts connect this sensor work to upcoming sample-return missions, including Japan and the US collaborating on the MMX mission to retrieve material from Phobos, with arrival targeted for late 2027 and sample retrieval for 2031.
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They describe the current gap as a 'translation problem': the sensor works in controlled lab conditions but needs tuning to match the distributions seen in actual meteorite or asteroid samples.
ChemistryNeuroscienceNobel PrizeParticle PhysicsAstrobiology