It would be disappointing not to find life on Venus. But this is a good science

Repeat

The fact is that Venus’ hypothetical phosphine story is not a simple case of a shocking discovery that was shot down by further scrutiny. In fact, follow-up research is welcome. Science is doing its own thing. This is especially true when looking for extraterrestrial life-after all, Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

Paul Byrne, a planetary scientist at North Carolina State University, said: “I think this is a perfect example of how the scientific process works.” “Of course there are other studies that can try to solve this problem, and it makes sense.”

of The first preprinted paper It is suspected that the original was actually written by Greaves himself. After failing to ensure that more time was spent on the telescope to verify the initial findings of her team (the pandemic made access to the telescope difficult and in some cases impossible), she and her colleagues turned to The infrared observation archives conducted in 2015 could not find any signs. phosphine.

Of course, this is frustrating, but as Byrne said: “The lack of evidence for a given test does not mean that there is no evidence of detection. This may mean that the problem is more complicated than we want.” Venus may actually not There is no phosphine, or it will change over time. Perhaps the archive observations analyzed by Greaves have not yet reached the cloud.

When it comes to this type of investigation, repeatability is actually a common problem. For example, we are currently debating the characterization of methane on Mars: NASA’s Curiosity rover has a Has a history of detecting huge peaks of methane on Earth, And ESA’s Trace Gas Orbiter aims to study gas on Mars through a more sensitive instrument than the Curiosity. Found Bupkis. same Hubble Space Telescope detects water plume on Europa: Subsequent investigation Try to find them.

Still processing

Another problem that plagues phosphine research is data processing. Two other preprints Was written by the team Attempt to reprocess the original data Used by Greaves and her team, suspected that the original analysis was flawed. Pulling the signal out of the large amount of noise found in telescope data is often a challenge. The researchers in the original study used a technique called polynomial fitting, which should eliminate background noise around the spectral region where the phosphine signal can be generated. but As National Geographic The report stated that their approach may actually introduce the wrong phosphine signal.

Both of these new preprints reprocessed the data from scratch without using Greaves’ method. One only focuses on ALMA data Could not find phosphine. Other papers Viewed ALMA and JCMT data. The researchers did not find any phosphine signal in the ALMA data, and detected a signal that may be explained by sulfur dioxide gas in the JCMT device.

In addition, the ALMA Observatory Recently found a bug In its calibration system for collecting data, Greaves and her team work together. This does not mean that they made a mistake in the first place. “Even if the ALMA data is found to be incorrect, it still needs to be [JCMT] The data is correct. “Born said. “I think it’s not very clear to say “yes, there are phosphines” or “no, no,”. “

It is not clear which method is more “correct”. Olson said: “There is no official formula or rule for studying how biosignatures should be done.” Indeed, many advances in science stem from the fact that different groups deal with problems in different ways, revealing that others are not paying attention. Insights and clues.

The key is transparency. Byrne said: “No matter which method is used, as long as it is well-documented and easy to access (this is the method we saw in the Greaves paper and subsequent preprint surveys), as long as it is repeatable, it is important. “The differences are very good, as long as they can be discussed openly, it is good science.

After verification

If researchers even agree that phosphine does exist on Venus, it does not mean that there is life on Earth. “Phosphine is definitely a potential biological feature, but not as long as Biosignature. “Bern said. Phosphorus is produced on the earth by bacteria living in sewage, swamps, swamps, rice fields and animal intestines, but we know that it is also produced in certain industrial applications, and in Saturn and Jupiter. Gaseous planets are considered unsurvivable. As for what happened to Venus, we don’t know if this planet is enough to completely rule out some strange chemical reactions we have never seen before.

The same applies to other potential biological features we find in the solar system. Byrne said: “I can’t think of a compound that we can easily measure. It can only clearly indicate life.” Methane is produced by many kinds of bacteria on the earth (including those living in cattle), but it also Will be ejected by the volcano. Breathable oxygen (in the form of O2) was produced by the first cyanobacteria on the earth, but A strange reaction involving sunlight and a mineral called titanium dioxide Can also be produced in other worlds

Speaking of Venus, “This will be the debate we will face,” Olsen said. That’s because unless we send a mission to observe directly, no clue can be a concrete proof of life.

“At the same time, we can do something,” Byrne said. “But until we go there, it’s basically academic. The only way to answer these questions is to go there.”

Repeat

Of course, this is frustrating, but as Byrne said: “The lack of evidence for a given test does not mean that the evidence is not detected. This may mean that the problem is more complicated than we want.” Venus may actually not There is no phosphine, or it will change over time. Perhaps the archive observations analyzed by Greaves have not yet penetrated the cloud.

When it comes to this type of investigation, repeatability is actually a common problem. For example, we are currently debating the characterization of methane on Mars: NASA’s Curiosity rover has a Has a history of detecting huge peaks of methane on Earth, And ESA’s “Trace Gas Orbiter” (Trace Gas Orbiter) aims to study gas on Mars through a more sensitive instrument than the “Curiosity” (Curiosity). Found Bupkis. same Hubble Space Telescope detects water plume on Europa: Subsequent investigation Try to find them.

Still processing

Another problem that plagues phosphine research is data processing. Two other preprints Was written by the team Attempt to reprocess the original data Used by Greaves and her team, suspected that the original analysis was flawed. Pulling the signal out of the large amount of noise found in the telescope data is often a challenge. The researchers in the original study used a technique called polynomial fitting, which should eliminate background noise around the spectral region where the phosphine signal should be emitted. but As National Geographic The report stated that their approach may actually introduce the wrong phosphine signal.

In addition, the ALMA Observatory Recently found a bug In its calibration system for collecting data, Greaves and her team work together. This does not mean that they made a mistake in the first place. “Even if the ALMA data is found to be incorrect, it still needs to be [JCMT] The data is correct. Bourne said. “I think it’s not very clear to say “yes, there are phosphines” or “no, no,”. “

It is not clear which method is more “correct”. Olsen said: “There is no official formula or rule for studying how biosignatures should be done.” Indeed, many advances in science stem from the fact that different groups deal with problems in different ways, revealing that others are not paying attention. Insights and clues.

The key is transparency. Byrne said: “No matter which method is used, as long as it is well-documented and easy to access (this is the method we have seen in the Greaves paper and subsequent preprint surveys), as long as it is repeatable, it is important “The differences are very good, as long as they can be discussed openly, it is good science.

After verification

If researchers even agree that phosphine does exist on Venus, that does not mean that there is life on Earth. “Phosphine is definitely a potential biological feature, but not as long as Biosignature. “Bern said. Phosphorus is produced on the earth by bacteria living in sewage, swamps, swamps, rice fields, and animal intestines, but we know that it is also produced in certain industrial applications, and in Saturn and Jupiter. Gaseous planets are considered unsurvivable. As for what happened to Venus, we don’t know if this planet is enough to completely rule out some strange chemical reactions we have never seen before.

The same applies to other potential biological features we find in the solar system. Byrne said: “I can’t think of a compound that we can easily measure, it can only clearly indicate life.” Methane is produced by many kinds of bacteria on the earth (including bacteria living in cattle), but also Will be ejected by the volcano. Breathable oxygen (in the form of O2) was produced by the first cyanobacteria on the earth, but A strange reaction involving sunlight and a mineral called titanium dioxide Can also be produced in other worlds

Speaking of Venus, “This will be the debate we will face,” Olsen said. That’s because unless we send out a mission for direct observation, no clue can be a concrete proof of life.

“At the same time, we can do something,” Byrne said. “But until we go there, it’s basically academic. The only way to answer these questions is to go there.”

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It would be disappointing not to find life on Venus. But this is a good science

Filipino activists and journalists hope that Facebook will deal with the deadly false information from the government, causing the enemy to be “red marked” and killed (Rest of World)

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Filipino activists and journalists hope that Facebook will deal with the deadly false information from the government, causing the enemy to be "red marked" and killed (Rest of World)

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