“WASHINGTON  —  Nearby Venus is looking a bit more Earth-like with frequent bursts of lightning confirmed by a new European space probe.

For nearly three decades, astronomers have said Venus probably had lightning — ever since a 1978 NASA probe showed signs of electrical activity in its atmosphere. But experts weren’t sure because of signal interference.

Now a magnetic antenna on the European Space Agency’s Venus Express probe proved that the lightning was real.” (Link)

Not much to say about this, besides that I thought it looked cool when I read it.  Scientists think that lightning that that found on Venus could have been what sparked life in the original “primordial ooze”.  Scientists don’t know how life started, nor do they know exactly how or why our planet formed.  We can account for most other parts of evolution, except the very beginning of time.

Here is a rendition of what an artist thinks the lightning looks like.

-Justin