{"id":250805,"date":"2025-03-03T15:12:59","date_gmt":"2025-03-03T15:12:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2025\/03\/03\/a-private-mission-to-venus-aims-to-look-for-signs-of-life\/"},"modified":"2025-03-03T15:12:59","modified_gmt":"2025-03-03T15:12:59","slug":"a-private-mission-to-venus-aims-to-look-for-signs-of-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2025\/03\/03\/a-private-mission-to-venus-aims-to-look-for-signs-of-life\/","title":{"rendered":"A private mission to Venus aims to look for signs of life"},"content":{"rendered":"
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BOSTON <\/strong>\u2014Droplets of Venus\u2019 clouds may someday come to Earth. Researchers are testing a device that can gather mist from our planetary neighbor\u2019s atmosphere and deliver it to scientists so they can test the samples for signs of life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Venus is not an obvious place to look for life. Its globe-spanning cloud decks are made of sulfuric acid, \u201ca feature that was long believed to be sterile for any organic chemistry,\u201d said MIT planetary scientist Iaroslav Iakubivskyi in a Feb. 15 talk at a meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But in the last few years, lab experiments by Iakubivskyi and colleagues have suggested that sulfuric acid can support the organic chemistry that gives rise to stable nucleic and amino acids \u2014 the building blocks of DNA and proteins. Together, the data suggest that \u201crather than being a disruptive force, sulfuric acid might actually serve as a potential solvent for life-essential molecules,\u201d he said. \u201cStill, we have to go to Venus to test it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n

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A future mission to Venus could include floating a cloud-catching device from a giant balloon in the planet\u2019s sulfuric acid atmosphere, as shown in this illustration.<\/span>W. Buchanan<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Iakubivskyi\u2019s team is working with the private spaceflight company Rocket Lab on a series of Venus probes called the Morning Star Missions<\/a>. The first, a probe that will fall through Venus\u2019 atmosphere and measure the sizes of sulfuric acid droplets, is slated to launch in 2026. A later mission would use a two-ton rocket to launch samples into Venus\u2019 orbit to be picked up by a spacecraft returning to Earth. If successful, Morning Star would be the first private mission to another planet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Inspired by fog-catching plants in the Atacama desert<\/a>, the team built a prototype cloud catcher from four layers of wire mesh. The wires can be charged to ionize atmospheric droplets and attract them to the mesh<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n