"Of the morning star, the great star, it was said that when it first emerged and came forth, four times it vanished and disappeared quickly. And afterwards it burst forth completely, took its place in full light, became brilliant, and shone white. Like the moon's rays, so did it shine. An when it newly emerged, much fear came over them; all were frightened. Everywhere the outlets and openings [of houses] were closed up. It was said that perchance [the light] might bring a cause of sickness, something evil, when it came to emerge.
But sometimes it was regarded as benevolent."
(Ancient Mesoamerican recollections of Venus)
Sahagun, Bernardino de., The Florentine Codex,
General History of the Things of New Spain - Book 7,
Salt Lake City, Utah: University of Utah, 1952, p. 1

Expecting to find high levels of carbon monoxide created by sunlight and lightning, the researchers instead found hydrogen sulphide and sulphur dioxide, gases normally not found together unless something is producing them. They also found carbonyl sulphide, a gas so difficult to produce by inorganic chemistry that it is generally considered to be a marker for living organisms.

Schulze-Makuch said there may be unknown ways to produce hydrogen or carbonyl sulphide, but both need catalysts. On Earth, the most efficient catalysts are microbes.

He suggested the bugs could be using ultraviolet light from the sun as an energy source, which would explain the presence of strange dark patches on ultraviolet images of the planet.

This false-color view of the volcano Sif Mons was generated from Magellan SAR data and existing altimetry data. The image shows a region of the volcano just below the summit of the peak. A series of bright and dark lava flows is visible in the foreground. The brightest flows, which are relatively rough, are associated with the most recent volcanism in the region. The flows overlay older lava flows which are smoother and hence appear darker to the Magellan radar system. The volcano is 2 km (1.2 mi) high and 200 km (120 mi) in diameter. Vertical exaggeration in this image is about 20 times.

The rising material pushes the surface of the planet upward, producing elevated topography. This uplift also stretches the crust, forming the observed rifts. The hot material may melt as it approaches the surface, producing the observed volcanos.

here were much older spores waiting to be revived. On May 19, 1995, The New York Times carried a front-page story about them (4). Biologists Raul Cano and Monica Borucki had extracted bacterial spores from bees preserved in amber in Costa Rica. Amber is tree-sap that hardens and persists as a fossil. This amber had entrapped some bees and then hardened between 25 and 40 million years ago. Bacteria living in the bees' digestive tracts had recognized a problem and turned themselves into spores. When placed in a suitable culture, the spores came right back to life. As a control, the two biologists also attempted to culture from the same amber a number of samples that contained no bee parts. These cultures were negative, adding credibility to the experiment. This finding was originally reported in the journal Science (5) to general acceptance.

There are bacteria that metabolize iron, nitrogen, sulphur, and other inorganic materials. There are bacteria today that can live without sunlight. Archaebacteria that can withstand extreme heat have been found thriving in oil reservoirs a mile underground (9). Some species of cyanobacteria are highly resistant to ultraviolet radiation. The only thing absolutely essential for bacteria to live, grow, and multiply is liquid water. We are confident that the early Earth had plenty of water. Scientists believe that concentration of water in the earliest atmosphere for which they have data, over four billion years ago, was far higher than it is today.

Bacteria have the ability to colonize an unfriendly planet like the Hadean Earth. Not just had the ability but have the ability. These are not make believe stories. All of the bacteria we have considered, with all of their unusual abilities to survive extreme environments, are alive today!

Fascinating stuff bluebird! you get a WATS from me you do

Originally posted by DarkSide
I never heard of that before, very interesting topic. How come it's atmosphere isn't depleted?

Venus is special, it has an induced magnetic field, just like a comet!

Even though Venus has no appreciable magnetic field, the solar wind is prevented from reaching the surface by Venus's dense atmosphere and by electrical currents induced in its conducting ionosphere. The planet has a well-developed bow shock, but it does not have belts of trapped particles. Both the ionosphere and the extended corona of hot gas, derived from the upper atmosphere, help to divert the solar wind.

The Tail of Venus

In mid-1997, the Soho satellite detected a plasma structure issuing from Venus and almost reaching the surface of Earth. The report described the structure as "stringy." Such a structure could only remain intact if a current were continuously flowing from Venus to the surrounding space via the plasma tail. The discovery supports the idea that Venus assumed its present position in the solar system only recently, and has not yet achieved charge-equilibrium with its environment.

Interestingly, ancient names of Venus include the Long Haired Star and Bearded Star. Symbols and glyphs that carried the meaning "planet Venus" also carried the meaning "comet."

We suggest that in ancient times, this same "plasma tail" of Venus emitted a visible glow by the same mechanism that comets do today, plasma discharge.