Recent research has indicated that Venus is still geologically active and may still have the potential to host life. Some researchers have stated that the surface data of Venus showed evidence of tectonic movement that have pushed against each other.
National Academy of Sciences has published that the tectonic movements are not seen anywhere else in our solar system except on Earth’s interior. Tectonics is the large-scale movement of plates that make up Earth’s interior surface.
The researchers have analysed some images from Nasa’s Magellan mission to map the surface of Venus that showed large blocks of the lithosphere, which seemed to have moved. The team created a computer model of the deformation and found that slow motion was similar in style to tectonics on Earth. New technology was able to spot surface deformations that indicated there were large block structures in Venus’ lithosphere.
The journal writer Paul Byrne, an associate professor of planetary science at North Carolina State University stated that, “These observations tell us that interior motion is driving surface deformation on Venus, in a similar way to what happens on Earth. Plate tectonics on Earth are driven by convection in the mantle. The mantle is hot or cold in different places, it moves, and some of that motion transfers to Earth’s surface in the form of plate movement,” He also added, “We have identified a previously unrecognised pattern of tectonic deformation on Venus, one that is driven by interior motion just like on Earth. Although different from the tectonics we currently see on Earth, it is still evidence of interior motion being expressed at the planet’s surface,”
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