New Jersey home meteorite fragments contain 'extraterrestrial' amino acids - 6abc Philadelphia

A meteorite weighing over 2 pounds (1 kilogram) crashed through the roof of a Hillsborough, New Jersey, home on July 16, 2024, after a daytime fireball was seen across New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Rhode Island and Pennsylvania.

Traveling at roughly 32,000 mph (14.4 km/s), the fragile space rock broke apart about 22 miles above ground, and Newark Liberty International Airport's Doppler radar tracked fragments falling from Staten Island into New Jersey.

Only one fragment was recovered because it punched through a master bedroom ceiling; the homeowners caused no injuries, collected the pieces with gloves, foil and glass jars, and patched the roof before evening rain to prevent contamination.

A study led by Peter Jenniskens of the SETI Institute and NASA's Ames Research Center, published in Science Advances, identified the object as a rare, primitive CM-type carbonaceous chondrite that offers a window into the early solar system.

Study coauthor Dr. Danny Glavin of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center said researchers detected a complex suite of amino acids—the building blocks of proteins—in water extracts, most of which are rare or absent in Earth life and therefore "truly extraterrestrial in origin."

The classification's "M" references the Mighei meteorite that fell in Ukraine in 1889, and scientists say the Hillsborough sample could shed light on ancient water in the solar system.