Yup. Combined with phosphene it’s looking more and more likely. But still faaar from proven
Comment on BepiColombo Detects Oxygen and Carbon Ions in Magnetosphere of Venus
N_Crow@leminal.space 2 months ago
So, Aliens right?
Olap@lemmy.world 2 months ago
Faresh@lemmy.ml 2 months ago
If life is proven to exist on Venus, it would be really exciting. Besides the obvious reason to be excited there’s also my thought: If in this planetary system two planets out of
98 have life on it, then that would mean that life isn’t as rare as we conceived it to be.
very_well_lost@lemmy.world 2 months ago
In this case, the carbon and oxygen coming from a much more mundane source: the solar wind.
When high-energy particles from the solar wind collide with molecules in Venus’ upper atmosphere, they carry enough energy to break some of those molecules into their constituent atoms. Since the Venusian atmosphere is almost entirely CO2, you should expect the solar wind to generate a lot of C and O ions — which is exactly what we’ve now observed!