Environment British Columbia

Scientists find sugar in the Milky Way. It could help answer a cosmic mystery

The sugar was detected in the galactic centre region of the Milky Way where there is a dense concentration of gases and stars, about 26,700 light years from Earth.

Scientists find sugar in the Milky Way. It could help answer a cosmic mystery
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The sugar was detected in the galactic centre region of the Milky Way where there is a dense concentration of gases and stars, about 26,700 light years from Earth.

A group of scientists have made a sweet discovery after identifying naturally occurring sugar in the heart of the Milky Way, offering a sprinkling of new insight into the origins of life on Earth. According to a study published in the

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journal Nature Astronomy, the findings provide a clue to the source of the life-sustaining compound and how its vital presence came to be in all living things. Sugar’s inception on Earth has proven a longstanding mystery to researchers, who knew it must have been present in the early days of the cosmos, given life’s reliance on it, but whose attempts to recreate the chemical conditions that would have led to its emergence have largely fallen short, the study says. Get daily National news Scientists believe sugar may have been present on asteroids and comets that struck Earth during the primitive age of the solar system, as several types of it have been detected on asteroids and meteorites, according to the study, but the chemical’s source prior to that was unknown. Now, a group of astrochemists led by Izaskun Jiménez-Serra at the Center for Astrobiology in Spain says it has cracked...

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Published
Jul 13, 2026
Updated
Jul 13, 2026
Source
Global News
Category
Environment
Read time
3 min
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SectionEnvironment
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SourceGlobal News
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PublishedJul 13, 2026
UpdatedJul 13, 2026

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PublishedJul 13, 2026, 12:30 PMThis story was published by BC Post.
ImportedJul 13, 2026, 4:00 PMThe item entered the BC Post source pipeline.
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Global News Published Jul 13, 2026 Imported Jul 13, 2026
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Global News Jul 13, 2026
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