New research from the University of Colorado Boulder shows that Venus is losing water faster than previously thought, which could provide information about the planet’s early habitability.

Discover a new answer to the ancient mystery of Venus!

Today, the atmosphere of Venus is as hot as an oven and drier than the driest desert on Earth, but our neighboring planet was not always like this.

According to Converse, billions of years ago, Venus had as much water as Earth today. If that water was once liquid, then Venus was probably once habitable.

Over time, almost all of Venus’s water reserves have been lost. Understanding how, when, and why Venus lost its water reserves will help planetary scientists understand what makes a planet habitable, or what can turn a habitable planet into an uninhabitable one.

Scientists have theories to explain why most of the water supplies have disappeared, but the amount of water that has disappeared is actually greater than predicted.

Research conducted at the University of Colorado Boulder (CU Boulder) reports the discovery of a new water removal process that has been overlooked in recent decades but could explain the mystery of water loss.

Energy balance and premature water loss

The solar system has a habitable zone. This region is a narrow ring around the Sun where planets can have liquid water on their surface. Earth is in the middle of the habitable zone, Mars is outside on the very cold side, and Venus is outside on the very hot side. The place of a planet in this habitable spectrum depends on the amount of energy received by the planet from the sun and also the amount of energy emitted by the planet.

The theory of how Venus loses water reserves is related to this energy balance. Sunlight on early Venus decomposed the water in its atmosphere into hydrogen and oxygen. Hydrogen warms a planet’s atmosphere, acting like having too many blankets on the bed in the summer.

When the planet gets too hot, it throws the blanket away. Hydrogen escapes into space in a process called “hydrodynamic escape”. This process removed one of the key elements, water, from Venus. It is not known exactly when this process occurred, but it was probably around the first billion years of Venus’ life.

Hydrodynamic volatilization stopped after most of the hydrogen was removed, but some hydrogen remained. This process is like pouring out the water in the bottle, after which there are still a few drops left in the bottle. The remaining droplets cannot escape in the same way, but there must be another process on Venus that continues to remove the hydrogen.

Small reactions and big differences

This new research suggests that a neglected chemical reaction in Venus’s atmosphere could produce enough volatile hydrogen to close the gap between the missing water supply and the observed water supply.

The way this chemical reaction works is in the research of the University of Colorado Boulder. In the atmosphere, HCO ⁺ gas molecules, which are composed of hydrogen, carbon, and oxygen atoms and have a positive charge, combine with negatively charged electrons.

When ⁺ HCO and electrons react, ⁺ HCO breaks down into a neutral carbon monoxide molecule, CO, and a hydrogen atom. This process gives the hydrogen atom the energy it needs to exceed the planet’s speed and escape into space. The whole reaction is called HCO ⁺ dissociative recombination, but the researchers abbreviated it as DR.

Water is the main source of hydrogen on Venus. Thus, the DR reaction dries out the planet. The DR reaction probably happened throughout the history of Venus, and this research shows that it probably continues to this day. This reaction doubles the rate of hydrogen escape previously calculated by planetary scientists, changing their understanding of current hydrogen escape on Venus.

Understanding the conditions of the planet Venus with data and computer models

Researchers in this project used computer modeling and data analysis to study DR in Venus.

Modeling actually began as Project Mars. Mars also had water before – though less than Venus – and lost most of it.

To understand the escape of hydrogen from Mars, the researchers created a computational model of the Martian atmosphere that simulated the chemistry of the Martian atmosphere. Despite being very different planets, Mars and Venus have similar atmospheres. Therefore, the researchers were able to use this model for Venus as well.

They found that the DR reaction produced large amounts of fugitive hydrogen in the atmospheres of both planets. This result is consistent with observations made by the Mars Atmospheric and Volatile Evolution Mission (MAVEN) orbiting Mars.

Collecting data in the Venus atmosphere would be valuable to support the computer model, but previous missions to Venus have not measured ⁺ HCO; Not because it doesn’t exist, but because they weren’t designed to detect it. However, they investigated the reactants that produce HCO ⁺ in Venus’s atmosphere.

By analyzing observations made by the Pioneer probe and using their knowledge of the planet’s chemistry, the researchers showed that ⁺ HCO is likely present in the atmosphere in similar amounts to the computer model.

Searching for water

This research has solved part of the puzzle of how planetary water reserves are lost, which affects how habitable a planet is. We have learned that water loss occurs not only in one moment but over time and through a combination of methods.

Read more: Maybe alien life is hidden in the rings of Saturn or Jupiter

The faster loss of hydrogen through the DR reaction means that it takes less time overall to remove the remaining water on Venus. Also, this means that if oceans existed on early Venus, they could have existed for much longer than scientists thought. This allows more time for potential life to develop. The research results do not mean that oceans or life definitely existed. Answering this question requires more science.

The need for new missions and observations of Venus is felt. Future missions to Venus will provide some atmospheric surveys but will not focus on its atmosphere. A future mission to Venus, similar to the Moon’s mission to Mars, could greatly expand our knowledge of how the atmospheres of terrestrial planets form and evolve over time.

With technological advances in recent decades and renewed interest in Venus blossoming, now is a great time to turn our gaze to Earth’s sister planet.

Discovering new evidence of the impact that formed the Earth’s moon. Data from NASA’s GRAIL spacecraft have found large deposits of iron-titanium ore deep on the moon’s surface, suggesting the remnants of Earth’s moon Thea.

Discovering new evidence of the impact that formed the Earth’s moon

A study on a metallic mineral from deep within the moon has provided new evidence that the natural moon of Earth was formed long ago by the impact of an ancient planet.

According to the Daily Mail, this long-theorized interplanetary collision, which scientists believe occurred about 4.5 billion years ago, describes a Mars-sized planet called Theia that, after colliding with Earth, It turned into pieces of hot lava.

Although some of the remnants of Theia appear to have been buried in large, dense blobs deep in the African and Pacific tectonic plates, evidence remains unclear as to where the rest of Theia went after the crash, scientists said.

Now, new data from NASA’s GRAIL spacecraft have found large deposits of iron-titanium ore deep within the moon’s surface, suggesting that other remnants of Theia actually formed Earth’s moon.

Adrien Broquet, a planetary geophysicist at the German Aerospace Center (DLR), described the GRAIL findings as fascinating.

A new paper by Brockett’s group focuses on gravitational anomalies deep within the Moon’s surface. These anomalies are dense, heavy pockets of matter detected by the GRAIL spacecraft’s sensors. “Analyzing these changes in the moon’s gravitational field allowed us to probe beneath the moon’s surface and see what lies beneath,” Brockett said.

The GRAIL spacecraft detected two dense regions beneath the Moon’s crust in the region between the crust and the core, called the mantle, which correspond to deposits of titanium-iron ilmenite. If the Tia collision theory is correct, we can say that these reserves exist.

After Thea likely collided with Earth, and after pieces of the missing planet were buried deep in the Earth’s crust, pools of molten lava rich in titanium and heavy iron on the moon’s surface sank toward its core, pushing lighter rocks upward. Jeff Andrews-Hanna, a geophysicist at the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory at the University of Arizona (UArizona), said: Our moon literally turned upside down.

Computer models presented by Peking University (PKU) researcher Nan Zhang provided the main framework for the theory that titanium-rich material exists deep within the moon, and as a result, it can be said that the origin of the moon is fragments of The planet Tia.

“When we saw the model’s predictions, it was as if everything became clear to us,” Andrews-Hannah said. When we look at the subtle changes in the Moon’s gravitational field, we see the exact same pattern, which hides a network of dense material beneath the crust.

Earth-based research has identified two dense, unusual regions in our planet’s mantle, called LLVPs, which have given credence to the theory that an interplanetary collision created our moon Theia. One of the two LLVPs lies beneath the African tectonic plate and the other beneath the Pacific tectonic plate, which is monitored by seismic equipment similar to that used to detect earthquakes.

Their existence was discovered when geologists found that seismic waves are dramatically reduced at a depth of 2,900 kilometers in the two regions and are different from the rest of the Earth. Scientists believe that the material in these two LLVPs is between 2 and 3.5 percent denser than the mantle around Earth.

Last year, a group of researchers led by the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) came up with the idea that two LLVPs could have evolved from a small amount of Thia material that entered the lower mantle of the ancient Earth.

Read more: Why there is no gaseous moon in solar system?

To confirm this, they enlisted the help of Shanghai Astronomical Observatory (SHAO) researcher Professor Hongping Deng to investigate this idea using his pioneering methods in fluid dynamics.

After running a series of simulations, Deng found that following the impact, a significant amount of their material—about two percent of Earth’s mass—was injected into the lower mantle of the ancient planet Earth.

“Qian Yuan”, a geophysicist at the California Institute of Technology and one of the researchers of this project, said: “With a detailed analysis of a wider range of rock samples, along with collision models and models of the Earth’s evolution, we can infer the material composition and orbital dynamics of the early Earth.”

Their research was published in Nature magazine last year.

Alien life has become a fascinating topic for planetary research, and scientists are raising the possibility that life exists on many planets, so maybe alien life is hidden in the rings of Saturn or Jupiter.

Maybe alien life is hidden in the rings of Saturn or Jupiter

The search for life beyond Earth has led scientists to explore a variety of potential habitats, not only on the growing list of known exoplanets but also likely to exist elsewhere in the solar system.

According to Space, the first choice that comes to mind is probably Mars, which some scientists believe has oases of liquid water beneath its barren surface. Also, the discovery of phosphine in the Venusian atmosphere, a possible indicator of biodegradation, has sparked debate about whether life could exist in the clouds of the hot, hellish planet. Furthermore, scientists have wondered for decades whether life could exist in the skies of gas giants like Jupiter.

One place that few scientists have considered for the possibility of life is the series of rings that line Jupiter’s corona outside the gas giant’s atmosphere. These rings, like the rings around all the gas giants in our solar system, are actually belts made up mainly of water ice particles. Some of these particles are as small as grains of sand and others are as big as mountains.

Scientists generally believe that an environment that can support life in its currently known form requires three key components. The first component is a type of energy source that usually comes from the heat and light of a star, and living organisms can use it for photosynthesis. The second component is organic matter. These substances are carbon-containing chemical compounds that may form living organisms. The third component is liquid water. Everything from the moon to distant comets may contain water in frozen form, but for life to exist, water must be in liquid form.

Consider Saturn’s visible rings. Within them, there are two of the three components necessary for life as we know it. Although Saturn’s rings may seem like an unlikely place for organic matter to exist, NASA’s Cassini mission has shown that carbonaceous compounds such as butane and propane are leaking from Saturn’s innermost rings into the gas giant’s atmosphere.

The third component, liquid water, is a missing piece of this puzzle. Matthew Tiscareno, a planetary scientist at the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) said: “You have organic material falling in the rings and there is sunlight, but no trace of liquid water.” Water is abundant but it is frozen.

This makes the existence of life in any of the rings of the solar system, which are all too far away and too cold to melt water ice, a difficult possibility. They are closer, the sun’s heat can provide the liquid water we seek.

Despite all their efforts, scientists have yet to find rings around an inner planet, either in our own solar system or in another system. Therefore, they can only make educated guesses about the shape of these rings. Instead of the water-ice rings we find around Jupiter or Saturn, these warmer rings may be collections of boulders.

Related article: 12 new moons were discovered for Jupiter

It is difficult to keep water in liquid form due to the conditions of the surrounding space. Without an atmosphere, liquid water tends to evaporate. An atmosphere is needed to keep liquid water stable, Tiscarno noted.

Many scientists think that simple life may have arrived on Earth billions of years ago by hitching a ride on an asteroid that hit a much younger planet. This theory called “Panspermia” was strengthened in 2023. At that time, scientists found an organic compound called uracil and a component of arane in a sample obtained by Japan’s Hayabusa 2 mission from the asteroid Ryugu. On the other hand, there are doubts about whether these compounds really originated from the asteroids themselves.