Although its surface is a horror show, life could be thriving elsewhere on Venus: ScienceAlert

Venus, but for some quirks of planetary evolution, it could have been Earth or vice versa.

The two planets share many similarities, but where Earth is wet and temperate, Venus has a sweltering hot surface surrounded by a thick atmosphere of toxic and acidic fumes.

However, this atmosphere isn’t entirely inhospitable, according to new research. Although the chance of microbes thriving in such an environment is slim, it’s reasonable enough to bear in mind.

“Clouds could support biomass that could easily be detected by future space missions focused on astrobiology from its effect on the atmosphere,” a team led by molecular biologist William Baines of Cardiff University in the UK and MIT in the US wrote in a paper. . Posted in Astrobiology.

“Although we consider the odds of finding life on Venus speculative, it is not remote. The scientific reward from finding life in a non-Earth-like environment warrants consideration of how observations and missions are designed to be able to detect life if it is there.”

The possibilities of life on Venus have loomed large in Earth’s collective imagination since traces of phosphine gas were discovered in the planet’s atmosphere in 2020.

Phosphine can be produced through biological and geological processes, and its discovery has been hotly debated. The debate has sparked intense scientific interest in re-examining our preconceived assumptions about the habitability of Venus, or the lack thereof.

The surface itself is unlikely to be habitable to life as we know it: temperatures on Venus average around 464 degrees Celsius (867 Fahrenheit). The chemistry of life requires a solvent (here on Earth, that’s water), and those temperatures are not compatible with any liquid. But Venus’s sky, though milder, is so It was covered with clouds of sulfuric acid And he didn’t think it was much better.

Pines is a member of a a team Led by astronomer Sarah Seager and including biochemist Janusz Petkowski, both of MIT, they are investigating the possibility of life in Venus’ atmosphere.

This team has just released two new papers. a paper in it PNAS by a larger group led by Seager experimentally exploring whether key molecules for life could survive in sulfuric acid; the Astrobiology The above paper examines and addresses the arguments against the validity of Venus.

Let’s talk about sulfuric acid first. Previous research from the team found that sulfuric acid could be Life uses it as a solventBut it wouldn’t be life as we know it. One of the main reasons for this is that RNA and DNA are not stable in sulfuric acid. But nucleobases—the basic building blocks of RNA and DNA—may not be, depending on what they are.

To test whether nucleobases can remain stable in sulfuric acid, … well, the researchers put a bunch of nucleobases in sulfuric acid in concentrations between 81 and 98 percent, with the rest being water.

Adenine, cytosine, guanine, thymine, and uracil remained stable for several weeks at room temperature, between 18 and 21 °C, similar to the temperatures of the clouds on Venus.

So did purines and pyrimidines, as well as a compound called 2,6-diaminopurene, which is used as a genetic replacement for adenine by some viruses. This means, in theory, at least, that the same nucleobases could wander quite happily in the clouds of sulfuric acid on Venus.

“Our findings show that complex organic chemistry, including DNA bases of DNA, can be stable in concentrated sulfuric acid and motivate us to design missions that directly probe cloud molecules for the presence of organic matter.” they write.

In the second paper, the team breaks down the arguments against the possibility of life, focusing largely on whether the features of Venus’s clouds and atmosphere make the possibility of vanishing life unlikely.

The lack of water is a major obstacle because life on Earth depends on it. This is what research into sulfuric acid addresses, and the researchers found that it is not impossible for sulfuric acid to take on the role that water plays here on Earth.

Another obstacle is gravity. Any mass, no matter how small, will have a hard time staying aloft against the downward pressure exerted by gravity. In this case, The team found that gravitational waves – just waves in the atmosphere; We have here on Earth – it can keep a large population of microbes aloft to maintain a stable biosphere. Instead, there is an effect called Negative photophoresis The heat from the light can be used to provide a lift.

Although there is not enough chemical energy in the atmosphere of Venus to sustain life, there is plenty of life. It is sufficient, according to the team’s calculations, to grow and maintain biomass by photosynthesis or Photofeeding. Nor did the team find that the lack of hydrogen or metals on Venus was sufficient for a barrier to completely rule out the possibility of life.

The researchers confirmed that this life is worth looking for. If there is, it is unlikely to be like anything we experience here on Earth, and learning about it could greatly enhance our understanding of the diverse ways life can manifest itself in our universe.

“While life on Venus remains speculative, and although the majority of society believes there is little chance of life in the clouds of Venus, none of the arguments exclude the possibility of life there.” they write.

“Terrestrial life cannot survive in the clouds of Venus. We encourage others to consider Venus as a place where some very non-terrestrial life could live and to explore what that life might be like and how we might search for it economically.”

Both are open access and worth a read. can be found at PNAS And Astrobiology.