The Origin of Water in the Solar System

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Water drives every mechanism on a rocky, plantry body from plate tectonics down to different types of minerals that Earth has. It's a perfect environment for the kinds of chemical reactions that actually create life. We just need the water to keep our cells intact really because cells dehydrate and they start to degrade. And then if you don't get water, you die.

Life as we know it needs water, but scientists can’t figure out where Earth’s water came from. Answering that question is just one piece of an even bigger mystery: “Why are we here?”

This is the first episode in our new three-part series, Origins, about the beginnings and boundaries of life on Earth.

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