Sweet Molecule Could Lead Us To Alien Life

Matt_dk writes "Scientists have detected an organic sugar molecule that is directly linked to the origin of life in a region of our galaxy where habitable planets could exist. The international team of researchers used the IRAM radio telescope in France to detect the molecule in a massive star forming region of space, some 26,000 light years from Earth."

Re:Powerful telescope

[Psychotria]

Well, you know how things are. For simplification "the presence of..." or the "signature of" or whatever way you want to phrase it is dropped and implied. It's not incorrect to state something like "we detected the presence of the molecule H2O..." (for example). But you'd not say that, because H2O is a well-known molecule. You'd say something like "we detected H2O". If H2O was not a well-known molecule, then I guess you might say something like "we detected the molecule H2O" to define which molecule you detected.

Re:Powerful telescope

[Psychotria]

I'm not missing the point. Detecting a molecule is very different to detecting the molecule. The word "molecule" does not have to be singular. I realise the GP was probably trying to be funny, or over-pedantic, but the semantics of the summary and the Prof quoted in the story do make sense and obviously does not mean a single molecule.

Umm guys?

[pugugly]

"The observations confirmed the presence of three lines of glycolaldegyde towards the most central part of the core of the region"

Three lines?

Umm I hate to mention it, but that's not sugar . . .

Pug