Complex multicellular organisms...?

Question

Earth was more then 4 billion years old before complex multicellular organisms with hard body parts appeared. Would you expect to find similar life forms on a planet orbiting a star 10 times the sun's mass? Why?

Answer 1

There is a theory that it took life a "longer than average" stretch of time (before it became multi-cellular) because there was not enough oxygen in the atmosphere to support more complex life until about 650 million years ago. Plate tectonics and an active, alive young Earth vigorously and quickly recycled her crust, causing it to combine with other compounds. The initial oxygen emitted by microbes had to combine with all that iron that was laying around first, before it could start to build up in the air.

The same is NOT true of Mars. She lost her internal heat quickly and any plate tectonics going on would have ground to a halt. So if there was photosynthetic microbial life in her primeval oceans, oxygen could have built up in the air much more quickly instead of getting sucked out by material getting oxidized. It is possible that complex, multi-cellular life forms may have evolved very soon. Perhaps within 500 million years, before Mars grew cold and dried out. If so, we will find fossils.

A star ten times the mass of the sun will only stay on the main sequence for several million years, which I feel is not enough time, even in a optimistic Mars-like scenario, for complex life to evolve.

Answer 2

Any star with 10 times the sun's mass is technically a red giant type star and they have lifetimes measured in the millions of years instead of the billions of years our sun has. There's no reason to assume that all forms of life can *only* begin and evolve on long-life stars like our sun, but the chances certainly are better. We don't even understand fully how the first life began on Earth, so it would be hypocritical to decide that all life needs the same length of time to get started.

The bottom line is that I wouldn't discount life beginning on a planet or planets orbiting red-giant stars.

Answer 3

I don't see what the mass of a star has to do with it. I think that as long as the planet has all the elements necessary for life to start, it will. There has to be the right amount of energy. So the planet caan't be too close or too far from the star. There most likely will be an atmosphere (to block out harmful radiation, maintain a near constant temperature, etc).
I doubt that all else being equal, the mass of the star would negatively influence whether life would start on a planet if the distance of the planet from the star provided optimal temperatures in the form of non-lethal radiation.

Answer 4

Hi. A star 10 times the Sun's mass would not last long enough.

Answer 5

Yes

Answer 6

Mathmatically yes, spiritually no.