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Venus is often called the Earth\u2019s \u201cevil twin<\/a>\u201d since they\u2019re roughly the same size, formed in the same inner part of the solar system, and happen to be neighbors as well \u2014 although, as suggested by that moniker, Venus is horrendously inhospitable to life as we know it compared to our home planet.<\/p>\n The similarities may run even deeper than previously known. Scientists have previously suggested that Venus once had a moon orbiting it, which met its demise when an enormous object impacted with it. Other researchers believe its current lack of moons \u2014 beyond several trojan asteroids that don\u2019t directly orbit the planet and therefore don\u2019t meet the definition of a moon \u2014 means that Venus never experienced the kind of impact that could\u2019ve dislodged enough material to form a natural satellite.<\/p>\n Now, a new study<\/a> published in\u00a0The Astrophysical Journal upends that consensus, with the authors suggesting that Venus did indeed once have a moon \u2014 until it spiraled inwards and crashed into the planet\u2019s surface in an apocalyptic demise.<\/p>\n Put simply, Venus may have devoured its own moon.<\/p>\n \u201cMy study shows Venus didn\u2019t require a catastrophe to arrive at what we can see today,\u201d said lead author and University of California, Riverside, astrophysicist Stephen Kane in a statement<\/a>. \u201cIt turns out the gravity of the planet itself combined with the rate at which it spins naturally caused the moon to collapse on top of it.\u201d<\/p>\n The findings could have significant implications, even when it comes to investigating the habitability of distant worlds.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen people think about Earth twins around other stars, one question they ask is, \u2018Does it have a moon?’\u201d Kane said. \u201c\u201dMy study shows a disturbing scenario for many of those cases. If these planets don\u2019t rotate fast enough, the moon will crash to the surface, and that would change the course of history for those planets.\u201d<\/p>\n Moons don\u2019t always have a perfectly stable orbit. We know that our own Moon is moving away from us at roughly two inches a year<\/a>, the result of the Earth\u2019s relatively fast spin. Venus, on the other hand, takes far longer than 24 hours to complete a rotation, completing one revolution every 243 Earth days.<\/p>\n That sluggish spin means that a hypothetical moon may not have enough energy to escape Venus\u2019 graviational pull, and would be doomed to collide with its surface eventually.<\/p>\n Kane and his team used computer simulations to simulate this behavior, based on the interaction between the Earth and the Moon and consistently found that the moon would succumb to Venus\u2019 slow rotation.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen I made this discovery, I was shocked,\u201d Kane said in the statement. \u201cI thought surely the broad range of scenarios I was exploring would lead to a variety of results. But it all went pretty much in the same direction.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s important to note that the paper doesn\u2019t necessarily mean that Venus had a moon in the first place \u2014 but if it did, it likely was devoured by the planet.<\/p>\n Finding direct evidence about the existence of a past moon is extremely difficult. Some 80 percent of Venus\u2019 surface dates back to around a billion years ago<\/a>, indicating that its geological record may have been wiped out during a major resurfacing event.<\/p>\n Other possibilities include material of a possible moon buried deep beneath Venus\u2019 surface, something that would require extensive research to investigate.<\/p>\n Intriguingly, scientists suggest a major collision that could\u2019ve formed a Venuvian moon could\u2019ve made its once-habitable surface<\/a> no longer capable of supporting life, turning it into the extremely hot and inhospitable place it\u2019s known to be today.<\/p>\n At the same time, researchers still debate whether a moon is even necessary at all for life to flourish.<\/p>\n \u201cMy feeling is there are benefits to having a moon, but it isn\u2019t required for habitability,\u201d Kane explained in his statement. \u201cThe moon has definitely changed the way Earth has evolved through time, but we don\u2019t fully know how important that role is.\u201d<\/p>\n