Budding life in the clouds of Venus
Posted inAstrobiology Venus

Budding life in the clouds of Venus

If Venus’s clouds host life, reproduction must replace organisms lost into the hot atmosphere below. Here I explore budding living aerosols whose mothers retain waste while releasing daughters, drawing on the biology of budding yeast. Illustrative calculations estimate how much reproduction could occur before each mother leaves the cloud, and explore how these life cycles could preserve lineages and affect Venus’s atmospheric sulfur budget.
Posted inAstrobiology, Venus1 Comment
Hypothesis: Venus clouds host a large biosphere
Posted inAstrobiology Life Venus

Hypothesis: Venus clouds host a large biosphere

In our recent Astrobiology paper we presented a model in which Venus's unknown UV-blue absorber is consistent with a defined, very strong absorber at very high concentration in cloud aerosols. If that absorber is produced by life, the implied biosphere could be large enough to change the mass, chemistry, and physics of the cloud itself. Here I follow that premise through its consequences. Every major claim is phrased as something that can be tested. At this stage I would recommend to read the post as hard science fiction with numbers and interesting figures attached. However, the story fits the Venus observations, and generates explanations to a lot of yet unexplained mysteries.
Posted inAstrobiology, Life, Venus2 Comments