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We’ve all been hearing about ongoing¹ Mars exploration, and how water probably used to be abundant there. And a water spewing volcano was recently discovered on a small moon orbiting Saturn². Water is one sign that life may exist or have existed at some point.
我们总会听到一些关于火星探测以及火星以前含有大量水资源的事情。最近，科学家又在一颗绕土星转动的小卫星上发现了一座喷水火山。水的存在就说明这里存在生命或曾经存在过生命。

Sugar
糖

Astronomers³ have discovered sugar molecules⁴ floating in gas surrounding a young star about 400 million light years away. Not sugar as in the stuff in those little packets, mind you. We’re talking about carbohydrates⁵ simple molecules made of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen which are the simplest forms of sugar.
天文学家在围绕一颗年轻恒星4亿光年外的气体上发现有糖分子浮在其中。这里的糖可不是我们说的那种用糖纸包的糖哦。我们所说的是由糖的最基本形式---碳、氢、氧所组成的碳水化合物简单分子。

But the simple sugars that the astronomers detected, called glycoaldehydes, are thought to be one of the building blocks of life.
 但是天文学家发现的这种叫做甘油醛的单糖被认为是生命的重要组成部分之一。

How Do These Simple Sugars Form In Space?
这些单糖是如何在宇宙间形成的呢？

Scientists suspect that they form on ice covered dust grains in interstellar clouds. The really exciting thing is that discovering these molecules near a sun like star means that the basic building blocks of life may be present around new stars even before planets form.
科学家们猜测它们是在星际星云中由冰包裹的尘土颗粒上形成的。真正让人兴奋的是，在太阳这样的恒星附近发现这些分子意味着生命的基本组成部分在星球形成以前就已经出现在新星周围了。

Again, this doesn’t prove anything, but it’s one more clue about how life might have begun on Earth–and how and why it might exist elsewhere in the universe.
虽然这还是不足以证明什么，但这对于人们了解地球上是如何出现生命的以及如何、为什么宇宙的其他地方也可能出现生命提供了线索。