Save the date!
Scientists have revealed the exact date they think life on Earth will end.
The date marks exactly when oxygen will literally run out.
Researchers at Toho University in Japan, used NASA planetary models as well as a supercomputer that ran 400,000 simulations, discovering that Earth’s breathable atmosphere will collapse long before the planet itself is physically destroyed.
Nature Geoscience published the findings in a paper titled ‘The future lifespan of Earth’s oxygenated atmosphere.’
Basically, as the sun ages and becomes brighter, the Earth’s surface will become warmer. causing water to evaporate and the carbon cycle supporting photosynthesis to break down.
Plants will die, inevitably causing oxygen production to halt, meaning humans will slowly revert to a high-methane, low-oxygen hellscape.
Kazumi Ozaki, the study’s lead author, said: “For many years, the lifespan of Earth’s biosphere has been discussed based on the steady brightening of the Sun.
He highlighted that earlier estimates gave life a time span of about 2 billion years, but newer models cut that timeline in half.
“If true,” he wrote, “one can expect atmospheric O₂ levels will also eventually decrease in the distant future.”
So, in about a billion years time, anything that needs oxygen will be gone.
While the research doesn’t implement any panic, it is a grim reminder that life on Earth has an expiration date, and we’re closer to the end than the beginning.
