New Study Challenges Theory of Comets Delivering Life's Ingredients to Early Earth

A new study led by University of Cambridge researchers suggests that comets likely did not deliver the fragile organic molecules necessary for life to early Earth. Computer simulations indicate that comets would have impacted Earth too fast and too steeply, causing the immense heat to vaporize most of these molecules, such as hydrogen cyanide (HCN). Even in rare survival instances, the quantities would have been insufficient to support the origins of life, challenging a long-held scientific theory.