AP Biology--Blog 3

Hey there! Hope everyone had a great weekend. This week's blog post is about carbohydrates (sugars) and their possible role in life on Earth. Sugars are the building blocks of carbohydrates, the most abundant type of organic molecules in living things. Glycolaldehyde, an eight-atom sugar, has even been found in an interstellar gas cloud near the center of the Milky Way. Glycolaldehyde can react with a three-carbon sugar to form ribose, the basis for both RNA and DNA, so the glycolaldehyde found in deep space may be a chemical precursor to life on Earth. That cloud also contains ethylene glycol, a sweet relative of glycolaldehyde and the main ingredient in antifreeze. Either complex sugars can be synthesized between the stars or there is a truck stop at the end of the universe. In your blog post this week, please respond to this idea from Discover magazine as well as to one other blogger's post. If you are this first to respond, you will need to get on again later this week. Have a great day!