Nature had the conditions to "cook up" the chemical precursor ingredients for life before Earth formed, according to two studies published by the sample analysis team of NASA's OSIRIS-REx mission, which is led by Dante Lauretta at the University of Arizona.

In this video, Dr. Erika Hamden, professor of astrophysics at the U of A, talks with KALFAA science director Professor Tom Zega to learn about KALFAA's role in analyzing the Bennu sample.

Before this milestone, the curation team already had collected more than the 60 grams required to declare the mission a success.