Tectonic Movements on Venus Suggest Inferno Planet Could Still be Geologically Alive | The Weather Channel - Articles from The Weather Channel | weather.com - The Weather Channel

This image is a composite of data from NASA's Magellan spacecraft and Pioneer Venus Orbiter.

(NASA/JPL-Caltech)

Venus—the ‘lost habitable’ world of our solar system—is now considered a dead planet shrouded with a highly toxic environment. But in 2020, Venus hit the headlines after the detection of phosphine—a colourless, flammable gas—on its clouds. Certain anaerobic microbes on Earth produce such gas, and its presence on Venus sparked an intense debate over the possibility of life on the Earth’s sister planet.

While the claims are still heavily contested, the discovery did renew the interest in the exploration of Venus once again. As more astronomers turn their attention towards Venus, some mysterious yet fascinating phenomena are coming to light. For example, a new study has showcased evidence of tectonic motion occurring on Venus’ surface, suggesting that the planet could still be geologically active.

Deformation of the Venus surface

The study documented the geological activity through the movement of tectonic blocks residing in the crust of Venus. These enormous blocks of planetary crust showcased collision activity, thus signifying that the planet is still geologically active. The flow of heat inside Venus is thought to have triggered the movement.

Not just this, the slack interior movement has also brought changes on the surface of Venus, which appears like a surface deformation. The researchers used computer model techniques along with radar images from NASA's Magellan mission that was launched in 1989 to map the Venusian surface.

An oblique radar view of the largest block in the Venus lowlands identified by Byrne et al. Complex belts of tectonic structures bound the block, but the interior is much less deformed, hosting lava flows and a handful of impact craters.

(Paul Byrne, based on original NASA/JPL imagery)

“These observations tell us that interior motion is driving surface deformation on Venus, in a similar way to what happens on Earth. Plate tectonics on Earth are driven by convection in the mantle. The mantle is hot or cold in different places. It moves, and some of that motion transfers to Earth’s surface in the form of plate movement,” explains Paul Byrne, associate professor of planetary science at North Carolina State University and lead and co-corresponding author of the work.

This phenomenon may also explain the tectonic deformation that happens on the planets outside our solar system and the geological process of the young Earth at the age of 2.5 billion to 4 billion years ago.

Geological activity

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Scientists had long assumed that Venus consisted of an immovable lithosphere—rigid, rocky outermost shell—similar to the ones found in Mars or Earth’s Moon. This movement activity has given some hope in better understanding the planet. As per the study, this could also shed some light on the common traits of Earth’s sister planet as they ventured into different evolutionary paths.

The lithosphere—which includes the crust and the uppermost solid mantle—is where tectonic activities take place. On Earth, this top layer lies on the hot mantle that behaves like a very viscous fluid.

While investigating the images of the lowlands of Venus, the team noticed certain patches where large chunks of the lithosphere displayed some sort of movement activity. Surprisingly, the movement was similar to broken pack ice over a frozen lake—pulling apart, pushing together, rotating and sliding past each other. It also suggests some of the recent geological activity of the planet.

“We know that much of Venus has been volcanically resurfaced over time, so some parts of the planet might be really young, geologically speaking. But several of the jostling blocks have formed in and deformed these young lava plains, which means that the lithosphere fragmented after those plains were laid down,” explains Dr Byrne.

The post-formation deformities have led scientists to believe that at least some of these blocks may have moved “very recently—perhaps even up to today”. This study has opened new possibilities for understanding the geological history of the planet.

To leave no stone unturned, the US and European space agency’s have announced multiple interplanetary missions to explore Venus in the near future. Scientists speculate that the planet may have been habitable millions or billions of years ago, before turning into an inferno.

The study was published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and can be accessed here.

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2021-06-24 04:45:20Z
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