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Life on Earth could have been sparked by huge superflares from a hyperactive young sun, a new study suggests.
By shooting charged particles found in the solar wind at a mixture of gases present in Earth’s early atmosphere, the scientists discovered that the combined ingredients form significant amounts of amino acids and carboxylic acids, the building blocks of proteins and all of life. organic life.
Scientists have been intrigued by the conditions that sparked life on Earth since the 19th century, when it was speculated that life may have started in a primordial chemical soup known as a “little warm pool.” In the 1950s, experiments exposing gas mixtures of methane, ammonia, water, and molecular hydrogen to artificial lightning showed that 20 different amino acids were formed from the process.
Related: See amazing new photos of the sun from the world’s largest solar telescope
In the years since then, however, the picture has become more complicated. Scientists found that Earth’s early atmosphere was filled with less ammonia and methane than previously thought, and more carbon dioxide and molecular nitrogen, both of which are gases that require much more energy to break down than a single unit could provide. ray.
Now, a new study, published April 28 in the journal Lifehas used a particle accelerator to discover that cosmic rays from energetic superbursts could have provided the necessary boost for life on Earth.
“Most researchers ignore the galactic cosmics rays because they require specialized equipment, such as particle accelerators,” said the study’s lead author. kensei kobayashiprofessor of chemistry at Yokohama National University in Japan, said in a statement. “I was lucky enough to have access to several of them near our facility.”
Stars generate powerful magnetic fields, created through the flow of electrical charges in the molten plasma that runs along and beneath their surfaces. Sometimes these magnetic field lines become twisted before suddenly breaking, releasing energy in bursts of radiation called solar flares and explosive jets of solar material called coronal mass ejections (CMS).
When this solar material, consisting primarily of electrons, protons, and alpha particles, collides with Earth’s magnetic field, it triggers a geomagnetic storm that stirs up the molecules in our atmosphere to create colored auroras known as Aurora borealis. The largest solar storm in recent history was that of 1859 carrington eventwhich released roughly as much energy as 10 billion 1-megaton atomic bombs, but even this event is dwarfed by the power of a superflare, which could be hundreds to thousands of times more energetic.
super flares of this type normally only erupt once every 100 years or so, but that may not have always been the case. Looking at data from NASA’s Kepler mission, which between 2009 and 2018 collected information about Earth-like planets and their stars, a 2016 study in the journal Nature Geoscience showed that, during Earth’s first 100 million years, the sun was 30% dimmer, but super-flares erupted from its surface every three to 10 days.
To see what role superflares might have played in the creation of amino acids on ancient Earth, the researchers in the new study combined carbon dioxide, molecular nitrogen, water, and a variable amount of methane into gas mixtures they might expect to find in our primitive atmosphere. Then, by firing the gas mixtures with protons from a small particle accelerator (known as a tandem accelerator) or igniting them with simulated lightning, the scientists triggered the production of amino acids and carboxylic acids, both important chemical requirements for life.
As the researchers increased methane levels, the amino acids and carboxylic acids generated by both the protons and lightning grew, but to generate them at detectable levels, the proton mix only needed a methane concentration of 0.5%. , while lightning strikes needed 15%.
“And even with 15% methane, lightning’s amino acid production rate is a million times slower than protons,” said the study’s co-author. Vladimir Airapetianan astrophysicist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, who also worked on the 2016 Nature Geosciences study. “During cold conditions, there is never any lightning, and early Earth was under a fairly dim sun. That’s not to say that It couldn’t have come from lightning, but lightning seems less likely now, and solar particles seem more likely.”
Originally posted on LiveScience.com.
