国際宇宙ステーションを用いた地球外有機物の捕集・曝露実験

抄録

  A great number of experiments have been done to examine possible prebiotic formation of bioorganic compounds such as amino acids in possible primitive environments. There are two scenario of prebiotic formation of bioorganic compounds: An endogenous formation scenario and an exogenous formation scenario. The latter scenario was supported by the facts that a wide variety of organic compounds were detected in meteorites and comets. It is now suggested that organic compounds in extraterrestrial bodies were originally formed in extremely cold environments such as in molecular clouds. Laboratory experiments showed that complex precursors of amino acids could be formed from simulated interstellar media by irradiation with high-energy particles. It was suggested that such extraterrestrial organic compounds were delivered mainly by cosmic dusts. We have, however, very limited information on organic compounds in cosmic dusts since they are captured within terrestrial environments. We proposed a novel astrobiology mission “Tanpopo” by utilizing the international space station. In the mission, cosmic dusts will be collected with ultra-low-density aerogel, and organic compounds in them will be analyzed. In the mission, organic compounds simulating extraterrestrial organics will be directly exposed to solar ultraviolet light and cosmic rays at the same time to study the fate of organic compounds in cosmic dusts near the Earth orbit.