General, Research, Technology

Could the Earth be completely deprived of oxygen?

Once upon a time there was catastrophically little oxygen on Earth and only microscopic organisms resistant to extreme conditions could survive in such a harsh world. But over time, the so-called cyanobacteria began to emit a lot of oxygen and the atmosphere of ourthe planet has become more favorable to other life forms. Now we feel good - we can go out of town and get plenty of fresh air. But scientists are sure that this will not always be the case, and someday there will be much less oxygen on our planet. And the point is not that the air will be polluted by factories and cars. The Sun will be to blame for the future catastrophe, which, even without that, in 5 billion years will expand so much that it will completely swallow the Earth. But how can the sun take away our air? Let's figure it out.

About 2.4 billion years ago, Earth's atmosphere was poor in oxygen. Scientists believe times like these will come again someday.

Cyanobacteria Are tiny organisms that are capable ofuse sunlight to generate energy and produce oxygen in the process. It is believed that it was they 2.4 billion years ago that began to saturate the atmosphere with oxygen. Scientists recently decided that we might need cyanobacteria on Mars and here's why.

What will the Earth be like in the future?

About what will happen to oxygen on Earth inthe future, American and Japanese scientists pondered. According to the scientific publication New Atlas, they have created a computer model that predicts changes in the concentration of oxygen in the air depending on various factors. The researchers took into account climate change, geological processes and even the brightness of the sun's glow. It turned out that within 1 billion years, oxygen on Earth can disappear in any case. The composition of the atmosphere of our planet will become completely different and methane will prevail in it.

At the moment, there is a lot of methane on the surface of Titan, the satellite of Saturn. This is how its surface looks as seen by the artist.

The reason for such dramatic changes will beexposure to the sun. Scientists already know for sure that in billions of years the star will become very large and will shine much brighter than now. This will lead to an increase in the surface temperature of our planet and, consequently, the destruction of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Subsequently, the plants that saturate our planet with oxygen much better than cyanobacteria will simply disappear.

Plants will be wiped off the face of the Earth first.

See also: Saturn loses Titan - its largest satellite

Life on other planets

In general, the atmosphere of our planet can becomethe same as billions of years ago. It can also be compared to the atmosphere of Titan, the largest moon of Saturn. As with this celestial body, in the future, a thick haze may form on Earth, mainly consisting of methane. In such conditions, again, only organisms accustomed to harsh conditions - the so-called extremophiles - will be able to live. And people in billions of years will surely cease to exist. It is even difficult to imagine what will happen to us. Maybe we will fly away to other galaxies, or maybe we will simply evolve into creatures that we cannot even imagine now.

What we will become in the future, it's hard to imagine

Oxygen is considered the basis of life, but it is notquite true statement. For a long time, scientists believed that if there is oxygen on the planet, then life must exist. In the search for extraterrestrial life, it is not the very fact of the presence of oxygen that is so important, but the time at which the study of the planet began. According to scientists' calculations, the oxygen concentration required for the origin of life exists only in 30% of the entire life cycle of the planets. If there is oxygen on the planet, this may well mean that life once existed on it. Or the planet is just getting ready for its inception. But the likelihood of finding life that exists at the moment is very small.

TRAPPIST-1 d - a potentially habitable planet in the constellation Aquarius

In addition, it is very important for the origin of lifeavailability of water. It can hit planets along with asteroids - there is a theory that this is how it appeared on Earth. Once upon a time, liquid water could exist on Mars, but at the moment it is in a frozen state. To find traces of life on the Red Planet, the Perseverance rover, about which we have already written a lot, landed there recently. Perhaps, living organisms also once existed on Mars, but humanity just started studying the planet too late.

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In the future, humanity plans to move toMars, but this is also far from the most suitable place for life. Not only is there no liquid water, there is also very little oxygen there. At the moment, scientists are considering several ways to produce oxygen on Mars. And one of them involves the use of the MOXIE instrument built into the Perseverance rover. You can read more about it at this link.