Oxygen is an important biosignature. But researchers have identified another way that planets can have oxygen. And life isn't required.
So if scientists find oxygen in an exoplanet’s atmosphere, it strongly indicates that life might be at work. Simple life may be bubbling away in the planet’s oceans, taking in sunlight and spewing out oxygen. But new research has identified a source of oxygen that doesn’t rely on life.,” published in Science Advances. The lead author is Måns Wallner, a doctoral student in physics at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden.
Instead, high-energy radiation from a star can ionize the sulphur dioxide molecule. Sulphur Dioxide’s formula is SO, and when it gets ionized, the molecule rearranges itself. It becomes a “double positively-charged system.” Then it has a linear form with both oxygen atoms adjacent to one another and the sulphur at the other end. This is called roaming, as the oxygen atoms are free to drift around in chaotic orbits until settling into new compounds.
“Upon double ionization, two of the bound electrons in the molecule get ejected and can lead to changes in the angle between the atoms in the molecule,” lead author Wallner said in a press release. “Alternatively, as crucial in the present case, roaming can occur, that is, the atoms switch places, and the molecule takes on a whole new shape.”
This pathway to oxygen may explain some of the oxygen we find elsewhere. Io, Ganymede, and Europa all have oxygen in their atmospheres, and roaming could be the cause. Io is a volcanic place—the most volcanic world in the Solar System—so life is ruled out there. Ganymede and Europa have subsurface oceans, so they could potentially harbour life. But that life can’t build an oxygen atmosphere like Earth life. Another explanation is required to account for the oxygen found on these moons.
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