Venus is a similar size as Earth and appears to have similar amounts of carbon, and in the past the sun was not as bright, meaning more moderate surface temperatures. Humans love to speculate about traveling to other worlds the earliest recorded mention of a writer describing a trip to Venus dates back to a second-century Syrian novel, and both Venus and Mars featured as lush tropical paradises in science fiction up until the 1960s. “Our results suggest that Venus has been uninhabitable for at least 70% of its history-four times longer than some previous estimates,” said geophysical scientist Sasha Warren, a University of Chicago graduate student and first author of the paper, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

However, the question remained whether Venus started its life as a more habitable planet before a runaway greenhouse gas effect baked it dry.īut a new study from the University of Chicago argues there is little chance the planet was ever habitable.īy examining the composition of Venus’ atmosphere today and running simulations of its past to recreate those conditions, the researchers found very few scenarios in which the planet could have sustained liquid water and moderate temperatures for long. In the 1960s, telescopes delivered bad news: Modern-day Venus is thoroughly hostile to life, shrouded in thick acidic clouds and sweltering at 900☏. For centuries, humans have been wondering whether anyone lived on Venus.

Venus orbit