Venus Could Have Supported Life for Billions of Years

That's the belief of NASA Goddard Institute scientists Michael Way and Anthony Del Genio who have been taking a look at Venus climate data and creating computer models to represent different scenarios that could explain how Venus's climate was in its past and how it came to be as we see it today.

Of the 5 models used all 5 predicted that Venus would have had a temperature ranging between 20 °C to 50 °C which like Earth is ideal for liquid water to form and be retained , the models also predicted this period lasted for about three billion years when at sometime in the last billion years a cataclysmic event ,thought to possibly be volcanic , led to the greenhouse we see today.

The study was presented yesterday (Sept. 20th) at the 2019 Joint Meeting of the European Planetary Science Congress (EPSC-DPS), which took place from Sept. 15th to 20th in Geneva, Switzerland. It was here that Michael Way and Anthony Del Genio of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Science (GISS) shared a new take on Venus’s climatic history, which could have implications in the search for habitable exoplanets.

In three of the five scenarios, Way and Del Genio assumed that the topography of Venus was much as the same as it is today, the ocean ranged from a minimum depth of 10 m (~30 ft) to a maximum of about 310 m (~1000 ft) and a small amount of water was locked in the soil. They also considered a scenario with Earth’s topography and a 310-meter ocean, and another where Venus was entirely covered in an ocean 158 m (~500ft).

Venus as it could have looked a billion or so years ago.

As Way explained it:
“Our hypothesis is that Venus may have had a stable climate for billions of years. It is possible that the near-global resurfacing event is responsible for its transformation from an Earth-like climate to the hellish hot-house we see today.

By about 715 million years ago, according to Way and Del Genio’s study, the atmosphere would have been similar to what Earth’s is like today – composed predominantly of nitrogen gas with trace amounts of CO² and methane. These conditions could have remained stable up until present times were it not for a massive outgassing event.

This flies in the face of conventional notions of habitability, which state that Venus’ orbit places it beyond the inner edge of our Sun’s habitable zone (HZ). Within this “Venus Zone”, according to conventional wisdom, a planet absorbs too much solar radiation to ever be able to maintain liquid water on its surface.

But as Way indicated, their simulations all indicated otherwise: “Venus currently has almost twice the solar radiation that we have at Earth. However, in all the scenarios we have modelled, we have found that Venus could still support surface temperatures amenable for liquid water.”
www.universetoday.com...

If true that would mean the three rocky planets in the habitable zone of our Solar System at one time could have had conditions favourable to life as we know it , two failed one survived .... interesting if that example can be applied to other systems in our Galaxy.

a reply to: gortex

Suppose they had too many suv's and pickup trucks?

But seriously,, the way I understand it, the sun will eventually grow outward and consume our planet so it's not surprising that the inner planet could have sustained life.

What I'm about to say is completely unscientific and I expect that I may well get roasted for expressing my thoughts here... But nonetheless.

From a fairly young age I've always had this abstract idea that the rocky, internal planets, are all representative of something like an assembly line... IE once upon a time Venus was much as Earth is now and Earth was possibly more like Mars...

Further that, in time, Venus will start to seem more like Mercury, Earth will become like current Venus and Mars will end up the planet with the Earth like atmosphere.

It's just an abstraction and mostly my "feels" but it's always made sense to me for some reason.

a reply to: Hefficide

Mars used to have flowing water and an atmosphere. And most likely the beginnings of organic life, much like the Earth. The the loss of it's magnetic field as it cooled turned it into what it is today, as it's atmosphere was stripped away by the solar winds, and it turned desolate, with nothing to trap the warmth of the sun.

I don't think it's going to get better.

Venus is the opposite. It has so much atmosphere with an abundance of co2 that it traps in all the heat - not enough kids taking time off school, it seems... but I wouldn't rule out extremophiles there. Much like the Earth in it's deepest, darkest, coldest or boiliest parts.

And when the sun does devour the solar system in it's last effort of shining existence, well.. no one will be around to say "This was all a bit silly, really."

a reply to: gortex

Or Venus could have been the way it is from the beginning.

But it is interesting that a planet in a venus orbit could sustain liquid water. I guess the Goldilocks Zone needs some adjustments.

wasn't Valiant Thor from Venus?

didnt he live in a deep underground venusian version of area 51, or was he just disinfo?

originally posted by: moebius
a reply to: gortex

Or Venus could have been the way it is from the beginning.

But it is interesting that a planet in a venus orbit could sustain liquid water. I guess the Goldilocks Zone needs some adjustments.

Venus is already in the Goldilock's zone.

a reply to: gortex

And Immanuel Velikovsky was a mad man and his theories ridiculous,

a reply to: solve

I was not aware of the man , seems he had some interesting theories.

a reply to: gortex

Predicted the temps pretty close,

Would not be surprised if one day NASA says yeah the red spot of Jupiter is actually the skid mark when it kicked Venus out from its bowels.



You know, the dark side of Venus and all that,

a reply to: Hefficide

Back over about 2 billion years ago to about 680 million years ago the earth was pretty much uninhabitable, there were warm period's but the earth was frozen several times over in a period of super ice ages called the Snow Ball earth during which the planet looked more like Hoth from star wars.

At least a mile of surface material was eroded not once but twice during this series of super ice ages and so perhaps all evidence of any life that may have existed in those few war periods was also lost, it is believed that the planet froze even at the equator.

It is likely that the sun was much cooler during this epoch and of course that would also have meant that Venus may have bean much like the earth is today back then, perhaps with very long night's and day's that served as it's summer and winter season's but sadly today Venus is so how that it's ocean's have boiled off and most of the hydrogen that was once locked up with oxygen in that water has been bled off into space, other than that Venus is earth's twin sister planet, just a tiny bit smaller than the earth but it has a planetary ocean basin and at least two continental highland's.

Meanwhile if Mars was habitable back then it would have been down to it having a much thicker atmosphere and a still living planetary core and magnetic field to protect it.

The solar system is a very interesting place and one that has potentially many mysteries including the possibility that there were others living in it long before us - if they were not us that is.

(I once toyed with the idea of writing a time travel science fiction in which mercury was the core of Venus from a distant future were the sun had expanded and burned off the planets outer layers while Venus was the earth from that same future that had tried to escape it's fate at the end of the solar system by using a quantum time jump to place itself back in time not knowing that it had become a part of a repeating time loop and was still doomed to destruction, the earth had over time gotten closer to the sun as solar wind and other factor's had slowed it's orbital velocity until it was orbiting slightly further out than Venus is now, when they made the time jump there planet was shrinking as vast amount's of material were already ablated away by the heat of there future sun, there solar shield's vast orbiting sun screen's had failed and so despite having succeeded in the jump the survivors fled to both mars and the young earth which was still at that time uninhabitable only for another series of catastrophes to reduce them still further to a primitive state after there main colony on mars was obliterated and so a handful of these future/past human's then tried to survive on the earth becoming more and more primitive until they became there own ancestors - but meh it was just an idea for a cheesy sci fi plot and I am crap at character creation so never got off the ground).

originally posted by: moebius
a reply to: gortex

Or Venus could have been the way it is from the beginning.

But it is interesting that a planet in a venus orbit could sustain liquid water. I guess the Goldilocks Zone needs some adjustments.

Venus is actually still in the goldilocks zone, it is on the inner extremity of it but earlier in the solar system's history the sun was slightly smaller and much cooler so that zone may have been much wider, the very thing that could have once sustained life on Venus became it's death a thick atmosphere and a run away greenhouse event that resulted in it losing it's ocean and eventually most of the hydrogen in the water that had evaporated into the upper atmosphere.

NASA and other scientists thinks it's possible that there may be life today in the clouds of Venus.

Could Dark Streaks in Venus' Clouds Be Microbial Life? -- NASA Article

The cloudtops of Venus are considered to be a potential habitable zone for life as we know it, and have conditions that are Earth-like.

From the link:

A more exciting explanation for the dark streaks is that they are evidence of microbial life. “It’s a possibility we can’t overlook,” says Limaye, who is a member of the Venera-D science definition team....

…[In] a region beginning around 50 kilometers in altitude and extending a dozen kilometers outward is a sweet spot where the temperature ranges between 30ºC and 70ºC (86ºF to 158ºF) and the pressure is similar to Earth’s surface. Life could potentially survive in this zone where the dark-streaking UV absorber is found.

a reply to: LABTECH767

It is likely that the sun was much cooler during this epoch and of course that would also have meant that Venus may have bean much like the earth is today back then, perhaps with very long night's and day's that served as it's summer and winter

Sun was much cooler in distant past - solar radiation increases about 10 % every billion years

So during times of SNOWBALL EARTH solar radiation was less

Also levels of CO2 have fluctuated , the current level is 380 parts million

Earth has had 20 times that amount 8000 parts million - that is after life had altered atmosphere chemistry

a reply to: gortex

This is recycled news that is a few years old, still a great thread.

S&F

NASA Climate Modeling Suggests Venus May Have Been Habitable

“In the GISS model’s simulation, Venus’ slow spin exposes its dayside to the sun for almost two months at a time,” co-author and fellow GISS scientist Anthony Del Genio said. “This warms the surface and produces rain that creates a thick layer of clouds, which acts like an umbrella to shield the surface from much of the solar heating. The result is mean climate temperatures that are actually a few degrees cooler than Earth’s today.”

ETA - Recycled may be the wrong word more like added onto. I remembered reading this years ago and that picture you posted.

originally posted by: Hefficide
What I'm about to say is completely unscientific and I expect that I may well get roasted for expressing my thoughts here... But nonetheless.

From a fairly young age I've always had this abstract idea that the rocky, internal planets, are all representative of something like an assembly line... IE once upon a time Venus was much as Earth is now and Earth was possibly more like Mars...

Further that, in time, Venus will start to seem more like Mercury, Earth will become like current Venus and Mars will end up the planet with the Earth like atmosphere.

It's just an abstraction and mostly my "feels" but it's always made sense to me for some reason.

I have had a similar theory, but some what different.

Mars is dead, geophysical speaking. She could have hosted life at one time , but she does not provide a magnetosphere anymore to protect from the sun.

I think life could have started on Venus and migrated to Earth as Venus was dying and Earth was still getting it's # together .

Mars probably had it going on, then something cataclysmic happened to it and destroyed that planet.

Just my 2 cents.

a reply to: gortex

Not much public discussion about Venus
these days, nor its hypothetical history.

Good one! S&F

If you think about it if you put a Sci-Fi twist on the story of Noah it really could be a story of the ancient past where a doomed highly advanced civilization sent an "Ark" filled with DNA of it's world to repopulate another.

Just saying we may not be from around here.

a reply to: gortex

Not only can it be applied to other systems in this galaxy, but it can apply to the very planet called dirt, or earth, or whatever this floating rock is called.

a reply to: tulsi
Freaking Valiant Thor. Talk about taking on a poetic and artistic name, a moody and sensible people indeed, that and he did not know it also sounds like a male porn star.

The world is full of hilarity indeed, no matter were they come from.

I personally like the whole Nikola Tesla was from Venus ones though. Not to many of those threads around these days.