The perplexing findings about the asteroid Ryugu from the TGD perspective

Anton Petrov told in in Youtube video ( "Shocking Discovery of Earth Bacteria Inside Ryugu Asteroid Samples + Other Updates" (see this) of highly interesting recent discoveries, which might provide very strong direct evidence for the TGD view of quantum biology.

The motivation for studying asteroids is that they could have been very important in planetary formation. The Panspermia hypothesis suggests that they could have also brought life to the Earth. These findings provide a test for the TGD view of life which now suggests a very general basic mechanism for the emergence of life (see this).

Some basic facts about Ryugu are in order. Consider first the origin of Ryugu.

1. The surface of Ryugu is very young and has an age of 8.9 +/- 2.5 million years. The composition of Ryugu shows that its material has been at a rather high temperature about 1000 C and presumably near the Sun. Eventually Rygu would have left the inner solar system and its composition suggests that it has been very near to the Kuiper belt with distance 30-55 AU.
2. The asteroid that arrived near the Earth from outer space must have been for a long period in complete darkness. The object giving rise to Ryugu could have originated far from Jupiter, possibly near the Kuiper belt. Some compounds in Ryugu can only form near the Kuiper belt. A larger object of radius about 100 km could have suffered a collision near Earth and produced Ryugu with a size of 10 km near Earth.
3. Recently Ryugu orbits the Sun at a distance of 0.96-1.41 AU once every 16 months (474 days (16 months); semi-major axis of 1.19 AU). Note that the distance of Mars from the Sun is about 1.5 AU. Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.19 and an inclination of 6 degrees with respect to the ecliptic.

The circumstances at Ryugu are favorable for life.

1. The highest temperature on the Ryugu asteroid reaches 100 degrees C, while the coldest regions sit at about room temperature. Temperatures also change depending on the solar distance of the asteroid, lowering as Ryugu moves further away from the Sun. This would mean that the circumstances at Ryugu become favourable for life as it passes Earth. The lowering of the temperature at a large distance would not be fatal.
2. Hydration is essential for life. The required range of dehydration reaction temperature decreases with increasing substitution of the hydroxy-containing carbon: Primary alcohols: 170--180 degrees C; secondary alcohols: 100--140 degrees C; tertiary alcohols: 25 degrees--80 degrees C. Primary/secondary/tertiary refers to the position of -OH substitution in Carbon atom.
3. Ryugu contains liquid water and also carbonated water. Coral-like inorganic crystals are present. The sample contained carbon rich molecules, amino acids and components of RNA and hydrated compounds! Ammonium.
4. It has also been found that Ryugu contains phosphorus rich samples. Phosphorus plays a central role in metabolism and in the "dark" realization of the genetic code in TGD. The abstract of the article (see this) summarizes the findings.

   Parent bodies of C-type asteroids may have brought key volatile and organic-rich compounds to the terrestrial planets in the early stages of the Solar System. At the end of 2020, the JAXA Hayabusa2 mission successfully returned samples from Ryugu, providing access to a primitive matter that has not suffered terrestrial alteration. Here we report the discovery of a peculiar class of grains, up to a few hundreds of micrometres in size, that have a hydrated ammonium-magnesium-phosphorus (HAMP)-rich composition. Their specific chemical and physical properties point towards an origin in the outer Solar System, beyond most snow lines, and their preservation along Ryugu history. These phosphorus-rich grains, embedded within an organic-rich phyllosilicate matrix, may have played a major role when immersed in primitive terrestrial water reservoirs. In particular, in contrast to poorly soluble calcium-rich phosphates, HAMP grains favour the release of phosphorus-rich and nitrogen-rich ionic species, to enter chemical reactions. HAMP grains may have thus critically contributed to the reaction pathways of organic matter towards a biochemical evolution.

The panspermia hypothesis states that Ryugu and similar objects could have served as a source of life on Earth.

1. Overpopulation problem is the theoretical objection against the Panspermia hypothesis. No new forms of life are possible since no niches are left untouched.
2. There is also a second objection against the panspermia hypothesis as an explanation of these findings about Ryugu. It has been claimed that the Ryugu sample was contaminated by terrestrial microorganisms (see this). Nitrogen dioxide NO₂ is used in sterilization meant to remove, kill, or deactivate all forms of life present in fluid or on a specific surface. Life forms of Earth should not be able to colonize samples under extremely sterile conditions. If contamination occurred, its mechanism is unknown.

   The Ryugu samples contained terrestrial microbes and they evolved with time. Their DNA has not yet been identified. They resemble bacilles, which are everywhere on the Earth.

3. Microfossils have been found in meteorites (see this). They have been found also in Ryugu but only at the surface of Ryugu and were reported to be new fossils. The reason could be that microbes have survived only at the surface of Ryugu where they receive solar light necessary for photosynthesis. The contamination hypothesis states that terrestrial organisms might by some unknown mechanism have contaminated the surface of Ryugu and produced the microfossils.

Neither panspermia hypothesis nor contamination look plausible in the TGD framework. Life would have evolved by the same basic mechanism both at the Earth and the asteroids and other similar objects (see this).

1. Ryugu stays relatively near the Earth at its orbit. This could have also made possible the generation of organic matter inside the sample during the period that Ryugu has spent at its orbit around the Sun. This requires a model for how this happens and standard physics does not provide such a model.
2. The notion of the field body is central in the TGD inspired quantum biology and would act as controller of the biological body (see for instance this and this). Ordinary genetic code is proposed to be accompanied by its dark variant realized at the field body for ordinary particles at it having a very large value of effective Planck constant and behaving like dark matter. Could the field body of the Earth and Sun have induced the generation of organic molecules and even bacterial life forms in the same way as they did this at the Earth?
3. The notion of the gravitational magnetic body, characterized by gravitational Planck constant introduced by Nottale, containing protons behaving like dark matter, represents new quantum physics relevant to the TGD inspired quantum biology. OH-O^- + dark proton qubits and their generalizations based on biologically important ions formed by salts would be the key element of life (see this) suggesting besides chemical life also other forms of life.

   Any cold plasma (plasmoids as life forms) and even quartz crystals could give rise to these qubits at temperatures near the room temperature around which the flips of these qubits are possible. The difference of OH bonding energy and O^- binding energy determines the relevant energy. Its nominal value is .33 eV and is near the metabolic energy quantum of about .5 eV and near to the thermal energy .15 eV at physiological temperatures.

4. These qubits would make the matter living and life in this sense is universal. Dark genetic code is predicted and corresponds to the ordinary chemical genetic code. Basic biomolecules would give rise to analogs of topological quantum computers.

   The flipping of these qubits would make quantum computation like information processing possible? Pollack effect by photon absorption can induce OH\rightarrow O- +dark proton transition and the reversal of this process and the reversal of this process can take place spontaneously. If O^-+dark proton has a lower energy than OH, it can be also induced by a presence of electric field or absorption of photons by O^- so that OH becomes the minimum energy state.

Could one understand the findings about Ryugu in this framework?

1. The presence of gravitational magnetic bodies of Earth and Sun could have induced the formation of OH-O^- qubits and more general qubits, not only at the Earth but also at Ryugu. The presence of OH bonds requires hydration and hydration is indeed possible at Ryugu.

   Therefore the same mechanism could have led to the emergence of the basic organic molecules at the Earth, at Mars and inside the Ryugu asteroid and meteorites. Since the minimal distance of the Earth and Ryugu from the Sun is nearly the same, the temperature of Ryugu is near its maximal value when it is near the Earth so that the temperature would never get too hot.

2. Ryugu is under the influence of the gravitational bodies of both the Earth and the Sun. Ryugu passesnear the Earth repeatedly with a period of 4 years. The organic molecules and various hydrated compounds could have gradually formed during about 10 million years as it passed near the Earth. Also bacterial life could have emerged in this way. Therefore contamination need not be in question.

See the article Some mysteries of the biological evolution from the TGD point of view and the chapter Quartz crystals as a life form and ordinary computers as an interface between quartz life and ordinary life?.

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.