We might owe our lives to massive solar storms from the baby Sun that warmed up Earth just enough for life to kick off.
March 20, 2026
Original Paper
Proton Irradiation of Primitive Atmospheres of Young Exoplanets and early Earth: $N_{\mathrm{2}}O$ Greenhouse Warming and Prebiotic Synthesis
arXiv · 2603.18206
The Takeaway
Scientists have long puzzled over how the early Earth stayed warm when the Sun was 30% dimmer than it is today. This research suggests that violent flares of radiation from the young Sun blasted our atmosphere into creating greenhouse gases and the precursors to DNA, effectively acting as a catalyst for habitability rather than a destroyer of it.
From the abstract
The emergence of habitable conditions on the early Earth and on rocky exoplanets requires persistent energy sources that can drive both prebiotic chemistry and climate warming under magnetically active young G to M stars. To quantify the contribution of stellar energetic particle (StEP) events associated with superflares to the atmospheric chemistry of young planets with primitive atmospheres, we carried out a suite of laboratory proton irradiation experiments on mildly reduced gas mixtures. We