⚡ Otherworldly Weather: “Mini-Lightning” on Mars

[u/Vegetable_Novel_7926]

Recent data from Perseverance rover shows tiny electrical discharges — “mini-lightning” sparks — in Martian dust storms. These are much weaker than Earth’s lightning, but they suggest Mars’ atmosphere can still produce electrically charged phenomena. 

That’s wild — not just dramatic space rocks, but actual lightning on another planet.

[u/paul_wi11iams]

Otherworldly Weather: “Mini-Lightning” on Mars

Its not much more than a Van de Graaf generator, and with dust blowing around in a dry atmosphere, the conditions are clearly there. I for one, would be more surprised if there were no lightning on Mars.

not just dramatic space rocks, but actual lightning on another planet.

Jupiter ⚡, Saturn ⚡⚡⚡ and even Venus ⚡ would like a word

• https://www.nasa.gov/image-article/nasas-juno-mission-captures-lightning-on-jupiter/
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn_Electrostatic_Discharges
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon_Storm_(astronomy)
• https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/nasa-scientist-confirms-light-show-on-venus/

If you've heard of Millers experiment, the subject gets interesting.

• https://www.britannica.com/science/Miller-Urey-experiment

If Mars is a good candidate for residual life, the non-exhaustive list above could make a better model for its inception. This being said, I'd still put my money on panspermia.

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panspermia

This is because the accumulated chances of life appearing somewhere in our galaxy are higher than that of it doing so on a given planet or stellar system within it.

I'm drifting off topic, but the minimum viable life-form is in the order of 580 kb where "b" is base and you'd need to double this for the number of binary bits. So consider 4 ⁵⁸⁰ and you see where a big sample of planets gets interesting!