Scientists May Have Solved a Puzzling Space Rock Mystery That Could Change Our Understanding of How Life Began

Although carbon-rich asteroids are common in space, they account for less than 5% of the meteorites that reach Earth. To unravel this mystery, an international team of scientists launched a global investigation.

A global team of scientists may have uncovered the answer to a long-standing mystery in space science, potentially reshaping what we know about the origins of life.

While carbon-rich asteroids are widespread throughout the solar system, they make up less than 5 percent of the meteorites discovered on Earth. This puzzling imbalance has left researchers searching for an explanation.

Scientists from Curtin University’s School of Earth and Planetary Sciences, the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR), the Paris Observatory, and other institutions collaborated in an extensive investigation to solve the puzzle.

Their findings, published in Nature Astronomy, are based on an analysis of nearly 8,500 meteoroid and meteorite events. Drawing from data collected by 19 fireball observation networks operating in 39 different countries, the study is the largest and most detailed of its kind ever conducted.

Co-author Dr. Hadrien Devillepoix from Curtin’s Space Science and Technology Centre and Curtin Institute of Radio Astronomy (CIRA) said the team discovered Earth’s atmosphere and the Sun act like giant filters, destroying fragile, carbon-rich (carbonaceous) meteoroids before they reach the ground.

The Fragility of Carbonaceous Meteoroids

“We’ve long suspected weak, carbonaceous material doesn’t survive atmospheric entry,” Dr. Devillepoix said.

“What this research shows is that many of these meteoroids don’t even make it that far: they break apart from being heated repeatedly as they pass close to the Sun.

“The ones that do survive getting cooked in space are more likely to also make it through Earth’s atmosphere.”

Carbonaceous meteorites are particularly important because they contain water and organic molecules — key ingredients linked to the origin of life on Earth.

Paris Observatory’s Dr. Patrick Shober said the findings reshape how scientists interpret meteorites collected so far.

“Carbon-rich meteorites are some of the most chemically primitive materials we can study — they contain water, organic molecules, and even amino acids,” Dr. Shober said.“However, we have so few of them in our meteorite collections that we risk having an incomplete picture of what’s actually out there in space and how the building blocks of life arrived on Earth.

“Understanding what gets filtered out and why is key to reconstructing our solar system’s history and the conditions that made life possible.”

Implications for Planetary Science and Missions

The study also found that meteoroids created by tidal disruptions — when asteroids break apart from close encounters with planets — are especially fragile and almost never survive atmospheric entry.

“This finding could influence future asteroid missions, impact hazard assessments, and even theories on how Earth got its water and organic compounds to allow life to begin,” Dr. Shober said.

Reference: “Perihelion history and atmospheric survival as primary drivers of the Earth’s meteorite record” by Patrick M. Shober, Hadrien A. R. Devillepoix, Jeremie Vaubaillon, Simon Anghel, Sophie E. Deam, Eleanor K. Sansom, Francois Colas, Brigitte Zanda, Pierre Vernazza and Phil Bland, 14 April 2025, Nature Astronomy.
DOI: 10.1038/s41550-025-02526-6

Other institutions involved in the study were the Astronomical Institute of the Romanian Academy, National Museum of National History and Aix-Marseilles University.

The study was supported by funding from the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research.

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