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PNAS | February 27, 2001 | vol. 98 | no. 5 | 2138-2141
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Special Feature
Chemistry
 Extraterrestrial amino acids in Orgueil and Ivuna: Tracing the parent body of CI type carbonaceous chondrites

Pascale Ehrenfreund*,dagger , Daniel P. GlavinDagger , Oliver BottaDagger , George Cooper§, and Jeffrey L. Badadagger ,Dagger

* Raymond and Beverly Sackler Laboratory for Astrophysics at Leiden Observatory, P.O. Box 9513, 2300 RA, Leiden, The Netherlands; Dagger  Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California at San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093-0212B; and § National Aeronautics and Space Administration AMES Research Center, Exobiology Branch, P.O. Box 204, Moffett Field, CA 94035

Edited by Donald E. Brownlee, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, and approved December 29, 2000 (received for review October 23, 2000)

Amino acid analyses using HPLC of pristine interior pieces of the CI carbonaceous chondrites Orgueil and Ivuna have found that beta -alanine, glycine, and gamma -amino-n-butyric acid (ABA) are the most abundant amino acids in these two meteorites, with concentrations ranging from approx 600 to 2,000 parts per billion (ppb). Other alpha -amino acids such as alanine, alpha -ABA, alpha -aminoisobutyric acid (AIB), and isovaline are present only in trace amounts (<200 ppb). Carbon isotopic measurements of beta -alanine and glycine and the presence of racemic (D/L approx  1) alanine and beta -ABA in Orgueil suggest that these amino acids are extraterrestrial in origin. In comparison to the CM carbonaceous chondrites Murchison and Murray, the amino acid composition of the CIs is strikingly distinct, suggesting that these meteorites came from a different type of parent body, possibly an extinct comet, than did the CM carbonaceous chondrites.

dagger To whom reprint requests should be addressed. E-mail: pascale{at}strw.leidenuniv.nl or jbada{at}ucsd.edu.

www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.051502898
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