Thanks to solar storms created life on Earth – Interia

Recent findings indicate that without intense solar storm ever there would life on Earth.

Life on Earth owe storms sun

/ NASA

NASA has released an amazing image of the solar corona, which looks like a giant human eye. read more
                     

Astronomers have long known that the intensity of stars such as the sun rises with their age. When on Earth appeared life – some 3.5 billion years ago – our star shone with the brightness of 75 percent. the current brightness. On the surface of the sun all the time occurred to powerful eruption that threw into space huge amounts of matter and radiation. It is thanks to him, a young earth is warmed.

Scientists have long been faced by a paradox, which says that the young sun does not shine intensely enough to warm the Earth. The results of recent studies indicate that once the Earth’s atmosphere was half thinner than today. What, then, led to an increase in average temperatures prevailing on the planet?

With the help of Kepler Space Telescope, astronomers have performed measurements of hundreds of thousands of stars similar to the Sun at different ages. They found that younger stars are actually darker than the elderly, but they are also more prone to violent outbursts. These bursts of star can send into space billions of tons of high-energy particles that we see today as auroras. Once, however, auroras probably was not, and particles emitted during solar storms warmed our atmosphere.

The young Earth was weaker magnetic field, so the solar wind reached even around the poles. Solar storms feed the Earth’s atmosphere with the necessary elements to sustain life. As much as 90 percent. the atmosphere was a molecular nitrogen (today it is 78 percent). When high-energy particles hitting the particles nitrogen crashed into single atoms, which in turn collide with carbon atoms, which arose from carbon monoxide and oxygen. Successive interactions arose nitric oxide, a potent greenhouse gas (300 times more effective than carbon dioxide), which resulted in a significant heat of the Earth. Without this, there would arise molecules such as RNA and DNA, which are necessary to support life.

The land was very lucky that developed on her life. The same can not be said about Mars – the red planet’s magnetic field was not strong enough to heat the desert landscape today.