Asteroids hitting the Earth's surface puzzled scientists after they realised they contained a compound that researchers had "invented" just years before.

Between 1957 and 1968, scientists created new minerals in the lab they hoped would be excellent conductors of electricity, naming them heideite and brezinaite.

Although the materials were entirely manmade, just years later the same two compounds started showing up in fragments of meteorites landing on Earth – and how they had developed outside of a laboratory left even the brightest minds scratching their heads.

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Six decades on the mystery of how the minerals got into the space rocks in the first place remains unsolved – but physicist B.P. Embaid from the Central University of Venezuela may have an answer.

Embaid suggested in a study – which has yet to be peer-reviewed – the minerals could have been created by a different species, and would therefore be evidence of extraterrestrial technology, or a "technosignature".

"It is important to be open-minded and even provocative to consider the following question: are these meteoritic minerals samples of extraterrestrial technosignatures?" Embaid wrote.

Embaid added brezinaite and heideite were extremely odd minerals with unique formulations and layering, and that there’s a good chance they cannot naturally occur.

The physicist hypothesises, therefore, that all the brezinaite and heideite in the galaxy could come from a lab.

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"The genesis of these meteoritic minerals could require [a] controlled and sophisticated process not easily found in nature,” Embaid added.

However, not everyone's convinced – while the minerals are very unique, there's still every chance that they may occur in nature beyond Earth.

"I’m very sceptical these minerals represent technosignatures," Edward Schwieterman, an astrobiologist at University of California, Riverside, told The Daily Beast.

And the fact the minerals were found in meteors just years after their so-called invention is, disappointingly, likely just a coincidence – the minerals have likely been in space for hundreds of millions of years and can probably be found in countless bits of space debris across the globe.

The fact that scientists never noticed them before can be simply drawn up to the fact that they didn't know the minerals existed until they were recreated in a lab just 60 years ago.

Whether or not Embaid's hypothesis will go any way to proving the existence of aliens remains to be seen – but one space boffin believes we will discover extra-terrestrial life within just 25 years.

Physicist at Switzerland’s ETH Zurich Institute Dr Sascha Quanz said tech advances mean he believes he'll be able to find alien life in just a quarter of a century, stating: “There’s no guarantee for success. But we’re going to learn other things on the way.”

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