Researchers have discovered oxygen in the atmosphere of the planet Venus, the “hellish” neighbor of Earth, but the discovery does not change the calculations about the possibility of life in our cosmic surroundings, reports the Reuters agency, quoted by Agerpres.

Oxygen makes up about 21% of Earth’s air, while the rest of our atmosphere is made up mostly of nitrogen. And most living things, including humans, need oxygen to survive. Earth’s planetary neighbor offers a completely different story.

Its dense and harmful atmosphere is dominated by carbon dioxide – 96.5% – with a smaller amount of nitrogen and exhaust gases. Oxygen is almost absent. In fact, given that Venus receives much less scientific attention than other planets such as Mars, direct detection of its oxygen has so far remained a difficult operation.

Using an instrument aboard SOFIA, a Boeing 747SP aircraft modified to carry an infrared telescope as part of a joint project between NASA and the German Aerospace Center, scientists have for the first time detected atomic oxygen in a thin gas layer that is sandwiched between two other layers of Venus’ atmosphere.

They noticed that this atomic oxygen, which consists of one oxygen atom, is different from molecular oxygen, which consists of two oxygen atoms and is suitable for breathing.

What scientists say about the oxygen discovered on Venus

The researchers made a direct detection of oxygen first on the sun-facing side of Venus, where it forms in the atmosphere, and then found it on the sun-facing side, where it was previously observed by a ground-based telescope in Hawaii.

“The atmosphere of Venus is very dense. Its composition is also very different from that of Earth,” said physicist Heinz-Wilhelm Hubers of the German Aerospace Center, lead author of the study published in the journal Nature Communications.

The thick atmosphere on the second planet from the Sun traps heat through the greenhouse effect.

“Venus is not hospitable, at least not for the organisms we know on Earth,” the German physicist added.

According to the researchers, oxygen is formed on the day side of the planet thanks to ultraviolet radiation from the Sun, which splits carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide in the atmosphere into oxygen atoms and other chemicals. Then some of the oxygen is carried by the wind to the night side of the planet Venus.

“This detection of atomic oxygen on Venus is direct evidence of solar ultraviolet-induced photochemistry and the transport of its products by winds in the Venusian atmosphere,” said astrophysicist and study co-author Helmut Wiesemeyer of Max. Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy in Germany.

“On Earth, the stratospheric ozone layer that protects our life is a well-known example of such photochemistry,” added Helmut Wiesemeyer.

Venus, the planetary hell in the “habitable zone” of our solar system

Venus has a cloud layer that contains sulfuric acid and reaches a height of about 65 km above the surface of the planet, with hurricane-force winds that blow in the opposite direction of the planet’s rotation. About 120 km above the surface, strong winds blow in the same direction as the planet’s rotation.

It was found that oxygen was concentrated between these two rigid layers at an altitude of about 100 km, and that the oxygen temperature varied from about minus 184 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 120 degrees Celsius) on the bright side of the planet to minus 256 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 160 degrees Celsius) on the dark side.

Methods previously used to detect daytime Venusian oxygen were indirect, based on measurements of other molecules combined with photochemical models.

With a diameter of about 12,000 km, Venus is slightly smaller than Earth. In our solar system, Earth is conveniently located in the “habitable zone” around the Sun—a distance considered neither too close nor too far from a star to host life, with Venus near the inner edge and Mars near the outer edge of the Sun. this area

“We are still at the beginning of understanding the evolution of Venus and why this planet is so different from Earth,” said Heinz-Wilhelm Hubers.