Scientists from MIT have discovered that life may exist on Venus, the most inhospitable planet in the Solar System. The discovery was made after scientists detected phosphine in the upper atmosphere of Venus in 2020, leading to discussions about the possibility of microbial life in this mild-yet-acidic environment. Studies have shown that many of life's building blocks, including nucleic acid bases, dipeptides, and amino acids, are stable in an acidic environment, but DNA also requires a structural backbone. A new study suggests that cyclopentanes, five-membered ring structures resembling DNA, could make Venus a plausible candidate in the search for life beyond Earth. The study also suggests that a mission to explore Venus's atmosphere could motivate missions to search for signs of life in situ.