[HN Gopher] Signs of two gases in clouds of Venus could indicate...
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Signs of two gases in clouds of Venus could indicate life,
scientists say
Author : daegloe
Score : 55 points
Date : 2024-07-19 16:14 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.theguardian.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.theguardian.com)
| windex wrote:
| https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB835915673862027500
| josefritzishere wrote:
| This seems really optimistic.
| datameta wrote:
| "Our findings suggest that when the atmosphere is bathed in
| sunlight the phosphine is destroyed," Clements said. "All that
| we can say is that phosphine is there. We don't know what's
| producing it. It may be chemistry that we don't understand. Or
| possibly life."
|
| Either way, the discovery of the source or mechanism should
| prove highly illuminating to the study of exobiology. Pretty
| exciting, imo.
| digging wrote:
| Indeed,
|
| "If they really confirm phosphine and ammonia robustly it
| raises the chances of biological origin. The natural next thing
| will be new people will look at it and give support or counter-
| arguments. The story will be resolved by more data."
|
| He added: "All of this is grounds for optimism. If they can
| demonstrate the signals are there, good for them."
| blue_dragon wrote:
| Makes me think the Soviets may have been correct in their
| obsession over Venus, if only by sheer luck.
| Animats wrote:
| Venus needs more attention. Mars is boring. Luna is boring.
| Venus might have some action.
|
| And what about Europa?
| bloopernova wrote:
| Europa is orbiting Jupiter.
|
| Jupiter puts out a lot of radiation:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40978670
|
| For sure, Venus needs exploration. I'd like to see an
| orbiting station with a 10 year mission to explore the
| Venusian atmosphere via drones or other methods.
| marcusverus wrote:
| Any Europan life would be in its oceans, which are more
| than adequately shielded from radiation by a miles-thick
| layer of ice.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europa_(moon)#Subsurface_ocea
| n
| ccakes wrote:
| Venus definitely needs more attention but regarding outer
| solar system, my money is on Enceladus being the most
| interesting one
| idlewords wrote:
| Enceladus is the new Europa!
| moffkalast wrote:
| Mars is doable. Luna is convenient. Venus is pure acid under
| ridiculous pressure that melts any probe in minutes. Europa
| is too far for anything serious. Enceladus is even further
| away.
| idlewords wrote:
| We had a false alarm about Venusian phosphine (as the article
| mentions) a few years back. It would be very exciting to get
| these tentative detections confirmed.
|
| There is a lot of microbial life on Earth living in clouds,
| almost all of it uncharacterized. Microbes have been found living
| high up into the stratosphere. At the very least, a search for
| life in the clouds of Venus would prompt us to learn more about
| this fascinating ecosystem here at home.
|
| Review article on terrestrial life in the stratosphere for those
| interested: https://www.mdpi.com/1467-3045/38/1/8
| jvanderbot wrote:
| Does microbial life "live" there, or is it deposited there by
| other means?
| kjkjadksj wrote:
| Both. Some stuff its thought to be an evolved dispersal
| strategy.
| idlewords wrote:
| I believe the question of whether there's life that's
| entirely confined to clouds is open.
| bbor wrote:
| Here's an annoying question: how would one play the discovery of
| Venusian life into personal gain? I'm thinking "startup/invest in
| space" as a starting point, but surely there's a more
| fun/rediculous way.
|
| Let's assume that these signals are indeed based in life, and
| that that life is mostly boring to laymen -- some type of
| bacteria or lava tube denizen with minimal complexity, say
| yieldcrv wrote:
| Its the right question to ask: speculation breeds innovation
| and nothing else has motivated humans to bother
|
| the merely curious get nowhere, the financially incentivized
| risk takers with asymmetric upside have a selective evolution
| of failures and successes towards a couple that find an edge
| PaulHoule wrote:
| B a bullshitter like
| https://astronomy.fas.harvard.edu/people/avi-loeb
| shejdb688 wrote:
| That's what these researchers are doing. There's vanishingly
| little possibility of life on Venus; they're fishing for
| research funds in leu of proposing kinetic mechanisms for the
| phosphine.
| dvh wrote:
| Hasn't phosphine been ruled out as sulphur dioxide? (Very similar
| peak in spectrum)
| pavel_lishin wrote:
| For sci-fi fans, Stephen Baxter wrote a very cool short story
| about possible Venetian life. It's part of this collection, and I
| don't particularly want to spoil anything about it:
| https://isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?332397
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