A wild new theory has claimed the origins of life on Earth were delivered by aliens who were terraforming the planet into a habitable world billions of years ago.

Robert Endres, a scientist from Imperial College London, said that the building blocks of life on Earth might be too complex to have formed naturally, meaning they would have needed something (or someone) to help kickstart the process.

This idea, known as directed panspermia, suggests that aliens might have sent microbes or simple life forms to Earth to propel evolution, forever changing humanity’s view of where life comes from.

Endres theorized that this would have happened around 4.2 billion years ago, shortly after Earth cooled and water formed, with extraterrestrials potentially using a spacecraft or probes to deliver microbial ‘starter kits’ to the young planet.

The scientist added that the natural formation of life without any help was unlikely because the amount of chemical ‘order’ needed to form the first simple cells would have been too much to come together in just 500 million years.

This theory could rewrite current science by challenging the traditional view that life emerged from a chemical soup through chance, suggesting instead an intentional act by an unknown intelligence.

‘Today, humans seriously contemplate terraforming Mars or Venus in scientific journals,’ Endres wrote.

‘If advanced civilizations exist, it is not implausible they might attempt similar interventions — out of curiosity, necessity, or design.’

While a working theory, the US Pentagon released a 2024 report showing no evidence of alien life.

Directed panspermia, as first proposed by scientists Francis Crick and Leslie Orgel in the 1970s, suggested that an advanced alien civilization could have intentionally sent life to Earth, directing its formation to fit their purposes.

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