A Comet Is Spraying Alcohol Out Into Space

Earlier this year, astronomers from the Paris Observatory observed a comet in our Solar System spewing large amounts of ethyl alcohol, the same type found in alcoholic drinks, into space as it passed close by the Sunday.

Comet Lovejoy, named the ball of ice and dust releases the equivalent of about 500 bottles of wine each second during its peak activity in addition to a type of sugar. The team found 21 different organic materials in the comet, including ethyl alcohol and sugar, according to their October 23 study in the journal Science Advances. But that’s not the only reason why this finding is important; it can also be used to bolster the idea that comets harbor the kind of complex molecules that are necessary to jumpstart life on planets.

The team observed the atmosphere of the comet around this time when it was brightest and most active.

The researchers say that the sun actually stimulates the molecules in the comet’s atmosphere, which causes them to glimmer and glow at microwave frequencies that are specific to each molecule’s chemical composition. “Each kind of molecule glows at specific, signature frequencies, allowing the team to identify it with detectors on the telescope”, NASA explained in a release.

According to scientists, comets are remnants from the earliest creation of our solar system, and the discoveries made from come Lovejoy promotes the theory that, as they hit Earth billions of years ago, they carried organic molecules that could have helped jumpstart the beginnings of life.

While you’re busy freaking out about the giant asteroid that is going to do a fly-by past Earth on Halloween, NASA has discovered another rocky object whizzing around in space that is risky for a whole other reason. “Instead, life had something that was much more sophisticated on a molecular level”. So now you can see where sugars start forming, as well as more complex organics such as amino acids – the building blocks of proteins – or nucleobases, the building blocks of DNA.

The European Space Agency’s announced back in July that its Philae lander, from its comet chasing spacecraft Rosetta, detected a few 16 complex organic compounds on comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. The clouds contain countless grains of dust with carbon dioxide, water, and other gases forming a layer of frost on the surface of these grains.