New research describes numerous scenarios in which a rocky planet surrounding a sun-like star could evolve to have oxygen within its atmosphere.
According to a Phys.org report, in the quest for life on other planets, the existence of oxygen in the atmosphere of a planet is one possible sign of biological activity that future telescopes might be able to detect.
The research, Oxygen False Positives on Habitable Zone Planets Around Sun‐Like Stars, published in AGU Advances, underscores the necessity for the next-gen telescopes which have the capabilities of characterizing planetary environments, not to mention looking for multiple lines of proof for life on top of oxygen detection.
Joshua Krissansen-Totton, the study's first author who's a Sagan Fellow in the Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics at UC Santa Cruz, said, the findings are useful as they're showing there are ways to get oxygen in the atmosphere with no life, although there are other observations one can make to help differentiate these false positives from the real deal
For every scenario, the first author explained, they try to say what the telescope would need to be able to do to set this apart from biological oxygen.
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Future Telescope
In the next decades, probably by the latter part of the 2030s, astronomers are hoping to have a telescope that's capable of capturing images and spectra of potentially Earth-like planets that surround sun-like stars.
Astronomy and astrophysics professor and co-author Jonathan Fortney, who's also director of Other Worlds Laboratory of UCSC said, the notion would be to target planets similar enough to this planet that life might have occurred on them and characterize their atmosphere.
Fortney added, there have been many discussions about whether oxygen detection is enough of a sign of life. He also said this study indeed contends for the need to know the context of detection.
More so, what other molecules are found on top of oxygen, or not found, and what that tells about the evolution of Earth.
Meaning, astronomers would want a telescope that's sensitive to a wide range of wavelengths to detect various molecule types in the atmosphere of a planet.
Oxygen Buildup
Oxygen can begin building up in the atmosphere of a planet where nigh-energy ultraviolet light is splitting water molecules in the upper atmosphere into oxygen and hydrogen.
More so, the lightweight hydrogen favorably leaks out into space, leaving the oxygen behind. Other processes can eliminate oxygen from the atmosphere.
Meanwhile, carbon monoxide and hydrogen emitted by outgassing from molten rock, for instance, will react with oxygen, and rock's weathering also mops oxygen up.
There are only a few of the processes they study authors integrated into their model of the rocky planet's geochemical evolution, as explained in ETH Zurich.
Krissansen-Totton explained, if one turns the model for Earth with what they think was the first inventory of volatiles, he dependably gets a similar result every time, minus life, one does not get oxygen in the atmosphere.
However, he added that they found multiple scenarios where one can get oxygen without life. For instance, a planet that's otherwise akin to Earth but begins with more water will end up with very deep oceans, adding immense pressure on the crust.
This shuts down geological activity effectively, including all processes like weathering or melting of rocks that would eliminate oxygen from the atmosphere.
Related report is shown on Astro Byte's YouTube video below:
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