Collision may have created life elements on our Earth

The existence of the moon might be connected to the existence of life on Earth, according to a new study by a group of petrologists at Rice University in the United States. The study was published in Science Advances this month.

The study suggests that Earth most likely received the bulk of its carbon, nitrogen and other life-essential volatile elements from a planetary collision that created the moon more than 4.4 billion years ago. Most of Earth's essential elements for life - the carbon and nitrogen in you - probably came from the other planet.

According to a news release, the study's lead author, graduate student Damanveer Grewal, gathered evidence to test a long-standing theory that Earth's volatiles arrived from a collision with an embryonic planet that had a sulfur-rich core.