NASA Hubble: Mystery behind the presence of life's building blocks on a white dwarf unveiled

NASA researchers have unveiled the mystery regarding the presence of elements that are life's building blocks in a white dwarf star. This finding was made with the help of NASA's Hubble space telescope.

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White dwarf stars are the stars that are almost planet-sized and are the leftover burnt residue of normal stars.

They are present in the constellation, Bootes, located at an estimated distance of about 200 light years away from Earth. This white dwarf comprises elements like oxygen, carbon, hydrogen and nitrogen, which are known as the 'components of life'.

This research was carried out by a team of scientists, with Siyi Xu from the European Southern Observatory (ESO) in Garching, Germany, as the lead author and Benjamin Zuckerman from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), as the co-author.

"The study presents evidence that the planetary system associated with the white dwarf contains materials that are the basic building blocks for life. And although the study focused on this particular star — known as WD 1425+540 — the fact that its planetary system shares characteristics with our solar system strongly suggests that other planetary systems would also," said Zuckerman, as stated in a media release by the UCLA.

"The findings indicate that some of life's important preconditions are common in the universe," Zuckerman added.

Earth is believed to have been dry when it came into existence, and components that are the building blocks of life – water, carbon and nitrogen — emerged when other celestial bodies comprising these matters present in our solar system collided with Earth.

The scientists stated that the white dwarf must have been orbited by a tiny planet containing these elements, which must have been present in the planetary system. The minor planet's trajectory probably got disturbed due to another planet's gravitational pull and it slammed into the white dwarf, which shattered it into debris and gas because of the powerful gravitational field the star possessed.

"Those remnants went into orbit around the white dwarf — much like the rings around Saturn — before eventually spiraling onto the star itself, bringing with them the building blocks for life," Zuckerman revealed.

These events are estimated to have occurred around 100,000 years ago. 

"This was the first time that nitrogen was detected in the planetary debris that falls onto a white dwarf," said Siyi Xu. "Nitrogen is a very important element for life as we know it. This particular object is quite rich in nitrogen, more so than any object observed in our solar system."