IMPLEMENTATION OF THE MILLER-UREY EXPERIMENT IN SPACE

摘要

Prof. Stanley Miller and Prof. Harold C. Urey demonstrated already in the 1950s that amino acids, chemical building blocks of life, can be created from gases that were at the time assumed to be the major components of the early Earth atmosphere. The existence of such complex molecules outside the Earth environment has been verified by astronomical observations and analysis of meteorites and most recently in cometary samples returned to Earth by the Stardust mission. A potential environment in which such molecules could be synthesized in space is the so-called solar nebula.Under a contract by European Space Agency Joanneum Research (Graz, Austria), Graz University of Technolgy (Austria) and Verhaert Space (Belgium) are developing a Miller-Urey-type experiment which will be carried out in the microgravity environment of the International Space Station ISS in 2010. It is aimed at the investigation of prebiotic chemical pathways for the synthesis of organic compounds in the solar nebula environment. Solid silica particles serve as surfaces on which thin mantles of water ices should form. These ice-covered particles move through a spark discharge region stimulating chemical reactions similar to the original Miller-Urey-Experiment. The chemical reactions take place in pairs of cooled vials which are filled with different gas mixtures, also similar to the mixtures used by Miller in his original experiments. The vials will be transported back to Earth after completion of the experiment on ISS for analysis in the laboratories of the Science Team.The paper gives an overview of the project and describes the hardware of the Miller-Urey experiment in space. Measurement results obtained during parabolic flight campaigns, drop tower and laboratory tests as well as the operations of the experiment are described.