Was life carried to Earth on Comet?

• Comet 67P carries two ingredients for life: glycine, phosphorus
• Conclusive evidence of amino acid, DNA-builder detected by Rosetta spacecraft

They have been blamed for bringing worldwide destruction to Earth and triggering the kind of mass extinctions that wiped out the dinosaurs.

But it appears we may owe our very existence to a comet that smashed into our planet billions of years ago.

A spacecraft that has been orbiting a distant comet as it races through the solar system has sent back compelling evidence that suggests one of these icy objects brought the seeds of life to Earth.

The European Space Agency’s Rosetta spacecraft, which has been orbiting the duck-shaped Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko since August 2014, has discovered two key building blocks of life on the enormous block of ice and dust.

The research was reported in the journal Science Advances.

The probe has beamed back evidence of the amino acid glycine, one of the 20 needed to make the proteins found in all living creatures, and the mineral phosphorus, which forms part of Deoxy ribonucleic Acid (DNA)/genetic material molecules, on the comet.

It will add new weight to theories that comets like this may have carried the raw ingredients needed to kick-start life on Earth.

Glycine is the smallest of the 20 amino acids and is a key component in biological materials like collagen, which is one of the most abundant proteins in the body, forming bones, skin, muscles and tendons.