Origins of life

During the era known as the late heavy bombardment, from 3.8 billion to 4.5 billion years ago, comets and asteroids peppered Earth and delivered extraterrestrial organic materials, including tons of carbon each year. The new data suggest that meteorites delivered much higher abundances of amino acids to the early Earth than previously suspected. "The higher the contents of key molecules in primitive extraterrestrial materials, the more likely it is that exogenous material played a role in the origin of life," says Alexander.

- Science News (subscriber-only article, no link provided)

It sure would be nice to find an amino acid bearing meteorite in my garden.