Monthly Archives: May 2021

Introduction

Mars was named by the ancient Romans for their god of war because its reddish color was reminiscent of blood. Other civilizations also named the planet for this attribute; for example, the Egyptians called it "Her Desher," meaning "the red one." Even today, it is frequently called the "Red Planet" because iron minerals in the Martian dirt oxidize, or rust, causing the surface to look red.

No planet beyond Earth has been studied as intensely as Mars. Recorded observations of Mars date as far back as the era of ancient Egypt over 4,000 years ago, when they charted the planet's movements in the sky. Today, NASA has a fleet of robotic spacecraft studying Mars from all angles.

With a radius of 2,106 miles (3,390 kilometers), Mars is about half the size of Earth. If Earth were the size of a nickel, Mars would be about as big as a raspberry.

From an average distance of 142 million miles (228 million kilometers), Mars is 1.5 astronomical units away from the Sun. One astronomical unit (abbreviated as AU), is the distance from the Sun to Earth. From this distance, it takes sunlight 13 minutes to travel from the Sun to Mars.

As Mars orbits the Sun, it completes one rotation every 24.6 hours, which is very similar to one day on Earth (23.9 hours). Martian days are called solsshort for "solar day." A year on Mars lasts 669.6 sols, which is the same as 687 Earth days.

Mars' axis of rotation is tilted 25 degrees with respect to the plane of its orbit around the Sun. This is another similarity with Earth, which has an axial tilt of 23.4 degrees. Like Earth, Mars has distinct seasons, but they last longer than seasons here on Earth since Mars takes longer to orbit the Sun (because it's farther away). And while here on Earth the seasons are evenly spread over the year, lasting 3 months (or one quarter of a year), on Mars the seasons vary in length because of Mars' elliptical, egg-shaped orbit around the Sun.

Spring in the northern hemisphere (autumn in the southern) is the longest season at 194 sols. Autumn in the northern hemisphere (spring in the southern) is the shortest at 142 days. Northern winter/southern summer is 154 sols, and northern summer/southern winter is 178 sols.

Mars has a dense core at its center between 930 and 1,300 miles (1,500 to 2,100 kilometers) in radius. It's made of iron, nickel, and sulfur. Surrounding the core is a rocky mantle between 770 and 1,170 miles (1,240 to 1,880 kilometers) thick, and above that, a crust made of iron, magnesium, aluminum, calcium, and potassium. This crust is between 6 and 30 miles (10 to 50 kilometers) deep.

When the solar system settled into its current layout about 4.5 billion years ago, Mars formed when gravity pulled swirling gas and dust in to become the fourth planet from the Sun. Mars is about half the size of Earth, and like its fellow terrestrial planets, it has a central core, a rocky mantle, and a solid crust.

The Red Planet is actually many colors. At the surface, we see colors such as brown, gold, and tan. The reason Mars looks reddish is due to oxidizationor rustingof iron in the rocks, regolith (Martian soil), and dust of Mars. This dust gets kicked up into the atmosphere and from a distance makes the planet appear mostly red.

Interestingly, while Mars is about half the diameter of Earth, its surface has nearly the same area as Earths dry land. Its volcanoes, impact craters, crustal movement, and atmospheric conditions such as dust storms have altered the landscape of Mars over many years, creating some of the solar system's most interesting topographical features.

A large canyon system called Valles Marineris is long enough to stretch from California to New Yorkmore than 3,000 miles (4,800 kilometers). This Martian canyon is 200 miles (320 kilometers) at its widest and 4.3 miles (7 kilometers) at its deepest. That's about 10 times the size of Earth's Grand Canyon.

Mars is home to the largest volcano in the solar system, Olympus Mons. It's three times taller than Earth's Mt. Everest with a base the size of the state of New Mexico.

Mars appears to have had a watery past, with ancient river valley networks, deltas, and lakebeds, as well as rocks and minerals on the surface that could only have formed in liquid water. Some features suggest that Mars experienced huge floods about 3.5 billion years ago.

There is water on Mars today, but the Martian atmosphere is too thin for liquid water to exist for long on the surface. Today, water on Mars is found in the form of water-ice just under the surface in the polar regions as well as in briny (salty) water, which seasonally flows down some hillsides and crater walls.

Mars has a thin atmosphere made up mostly of carbon dioxide, nitrogen, and argon gases. To our eyes, the sky would be hazy and red because of suspended dust instead of the familiar blue tint we see on Earth. Mars' sparse atmosphere doesn't offer much protection from impacts by such objects as meteorites, asteroids, and comets.

The temperature on Mars can be as high as 70 degrees Fahrenheit (20 degrees Celsius) or as low as about -225 degrees Fahrenheit (-153 degrees Celsius). And because the atmosphere is so thin, heat from the Sun easily escapes this planet. If you were to stand on the surface of Mars on the equator at noon, it would feel like spring at your feet (75 degrees Fahrenheit or 24 degrees Celsius) and winter at your head (32 degrees Fahrenheit or 0 degrees Celsius).

Occasionally, winds on Mars are strong enough to create dust storms that cover much of the planet. After such storms, it can be months before all of the dust settles.

Mars has no global magnetic field today, but areas of the Martian crust in the southern hemisphere are highly magnetized, indicating traces of a magnetic field from 4 billion years ago.

Mars has no rings. However, in 50 million years when Phobos crashes into Mars or breaks apart, it could create a dusty ring around the Red Planet.

Mars has two small moons, Phobos and Deimos, that may be captured asteroids. They're potato-shaped because they have too little mass for gravity to make them spherical.

The moons get their names from the horses that pulled the chariot of the Greek god of war, Ares.

Phobos, the innermost and larger moon, is heavily cratered, with deep grooves on its surface. It is slowly moving towards Mars and will crash into the planet or break apart in about 50 million years.

Deimos is about half as big as Phobos and orbits two and a half times farther away from Mars. Oddly-shaped Deimos is covered in loose dirt that often fills the craters on its surface, making it appear smoother than pockmarked Phobos.

Go farther. Explore the Moons of Mars

Scientists don't expect to find living things currently thriving on Mars. Instead, they're looking for signs of life that existed long ago, when Mars was warmer and covered with water.

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In Depth | Mars NASA Solar System Exploration

More than half a century after Neil Armstrong took mankinds giant leap on the moon, another space race is heating up. This time, the promising new frontier for Earthlings is Mars, the planet next door.

A spate of robotic missions to the red planet, including NASAs Perseverance rover this year and Chinas Zhurong this month, have led to the inevitable question: When can humans follow? Unmanned missions over the decades have beamed a trove of information, including the presence of water ice on Mars, fueling expectations a human landing is possible. But how soon? And, are we ready?

Mars Base 1 in the Gobi desert in China.

Photographer: Wang Zhao/AFP/Getty Images

NASA wants to send astronauts to Mars, perhaps at some point in the 2030s. The United Arab Emirates -- which now has a spacecraft orbiting the planet -- is promoting a 100-year plan to create a colony there. While China has said sending humans to Mars is its long-term goal, those eager for a taste of Martian life can visit a simulation site in the Gobi desert for now.

The most ambitious of them all is billionaire Elon Musk. The founder of Space Exploration Technologies Corp. wants to send humans this decade, saying in an interview last year that he was confident a crewed mission could take place in 2026. Many scientists, however, warn of too many unanswered questions confronting deep-space travel. Musk has also acknowledged the risks, saying its tough sledding over there.

Honestly, a bunch of people probably will die at the beginning, the tycoon said in an interview with X Prize Foundation founder Peter Diamandis.

Here are some of the biggest challenges, from surviving cosmic radiation and dust storms to producing oxygen and water:

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The Apollo astronauts could fly to the moon in just a few days, but a trip to Mars would take anywhere between six to nine months. With the distance between Mars and Earth varying between 35 million miles and 249 million miles due to their elliptical orbits, theres only a small window available when the two are ideally aligned for space travel. That makes logistics much trickier.

With lunar exploration, theres always the prospect of rescue or provisioning or supply from Earth or from a midway space station, said Alice Gorman, an associate professor at Flinders University in Adelaide and a member of the advisory council of the Space Industry Association of Australia. Thats not going to be the case for Mars.

A long flight would expose humans to one of space travels biggest terrors: solar flares. The most powerful type of explosion in the solar system, a flare is the equivalent of 100 million hydrogen bombs. The Earths magnetic field can shield astronauts in orbit, but a deep-space traveler hit by such radiation would not be able to survive more than a few days.

A solar flare as observed by the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly on NASAs Solar Dynamics Observatory.

Its a very gruesome way to die, said Lewis Dartnell, a professor and specialist in astrobiology in the Department of Life Sciences at the University of Westminster in London. He does research linked to life on Mars.

The Apollo program didnt address this issue, choosing instead to take the chance that the few days of a lunar mission wouldnt coincide with a solar event. It would be a different story for multi-month trips to Mars.

Water tanks onboard the spacecraft could act as shields if positioned properly, said Dartnell, so in the event of a flare, travelers could retreat to the spacecrafts version of a panic room surrounded by water tanks. The problem is detecting activity on the Sun, especially on the side not facing the Earth. How can we make our space weather prediction good enough that we can give the crew notice? he said. We dont have established capacity to observe the Sun from different angles for tracking solar storms.

Radiation isnt just a problem en route. Mars has a much thinner atmosphere than Earth and doesnt have a global magnetic shield, so humans on the planets surface would be at risk of exposure to solar and cosmic radiation. Moreover, the surface itself is largely dust, and massive storms can create dust clouds that block out the Sun, said Nilton Renno, a professor at the University of Michigan whose research interests include astrobiology.

During such a storm, its almost like midnight on the surface of Mars for two months, Renno said. If you are there with solar panels for power, you very likely dont survive. You dont have enough energy to keep things warm enough.

One solution would be for humans to use that dust to protect themselves, lining shelters with sandbags filled with Martian soil that could block out radiation, said Joseph Michalski, an associate professor who explores the habitability of Mars at the University of Hong Kong. Humans could also return to their cave-dwelling roots by finding temporary shelter in some of the planets many lava tubes, large caverns from ancient times when Mars had volcanic activity.

In The Martian -- the 2015 Hollywood blockbuster -- Matt Damons stranded astronaut grew potatoes by fertilizing the planets soil with his own feces. Elisabeth Hausrath, an associate professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, has more modest farming ambitions. For the past year and a half, NASA has been supporting her research into growing snow algae, a type thats common in the Nevada desert and other high-altitude, low-nutrient environments on Earth, in conditions mimicking those of Mars.

Theyve been growing great, she said. The idea is that the algae could grow in greenhouses made of flexible material similar to that of a space suit. Growing algae in such conditions could not only create a source of food but also produce oxygen. The research is still in its early stages.

Scientists also still need to resolve how humans could get enough water to survive on Mars. The planet does have some sub-surface ice that could be water sources and a future Mars mission will need to use radar to map its distribution, said Victoria Hamilton, a planetary geologist at the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado. Once you know where the ice is, those are locations where you might send humans, she said.

Unless everyone signs up for a one-way trip, humans traveling to Mars will need to take a rocket back to Earth. Figuring out how to get fuel to power that spacecraft back into space is the biggest technological hurdle would-be Mars explorers face, said Michalski.

Its not the case that we would bring the rocket fuel with us, he said. Its just too heavy.

A woman wearing a spacesuit at Mars Base 1 in the Gobi desert.

Photographer: Wang Zhao/AFP/Getty Images

One solution might be to use the resources on the planet to make fuel by first electrically separating water from sub-surface ice and hydrated rocks, then combining the hydrogen and oxygen to make rocket fuel, said Michalski.

Sooner or later, optimists believe, scientists will solve these problems.

Today its definitely a place where we cant live, said Adnan AlRais, Mars 2117 program manager for the UAEs Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Center. But as we develop science and technologies, the answer might be different in 50 to 100 years from now.

With assistance by Layan Odeh

Before it's here, it's on the Bloomberg Terminal.

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Can Humans Live on Mars? Here Who's Trying to Do It and What Are the Obstacles - Bloomberg

Welcome to the 86th edition of 6 Storm Team Starwatch! This is a blog that will be posted every week that will list events happening in the sky!

The Last Quarter Moon occurs early Wednesday morning (Sky & Telescope). Jupiter and Saturn will be visible to the upper right of the Moon (Sky & Telescope). Remember, a Last Quarter Moon looks like a half moon (Sky & Telescope).

If you look to the West-Northwest about 30 minutes after sunset you will be able to see Venus and Mars (Sky & Telescope). Venus will be closer to the horizon while Mars is higher in the sky (Sky & Telescope). Additionally, the two bright stars Pollux and Castor will be visible in the constellation Gemini (Sky & Telescope). You may even be able to see two stick figure twins if you look closely (Sky & Telescope). The image below shows what to look for.

The following sites were used in the creation of this blog:

This Week's Sky at a Glance, May 28 – June 5

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6 Storm Team Starwatch: Venus and Mars visible in the sky this week - WATE 6 On Your Side

The Perseverance rover has created a breath of fresh air on Mars. An experimental device on the NASA rover split carbon dioxide molecules into their component parts. This created enough breathable oxygen to sustain a person for about 10 minutes. It was also enough oxygen to make tiny amounts of rocket fuel.

The toaster-size instrument that did this is called MOXIE. The acronym stands for Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment. Carbon dioxide, or CO2, is the primary gas in the atmosphere on Mars. MOXIEs job is to break the chemical bonds in CO2, releasing oxygen.

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The device works like an electrical tree, says Michael Hecht. By that he means it breathes in CO2 and breathes out oxygen. Hecht is MOXIEs principal investigator. He works at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in Cambridge.

When we burn anything, gas in the car or a log in the fireplace, most of what were burning is oxygen, Hecht says. On Earth, we take all that oxygen for granted. We dont think about it. But on Mars, oxygen is largely bound up in CO2.

MOXIE arrived on Mars along with Perseverance this past February 18. Two months later, MOXIE warmed to about 800 Celsius (1,472 Fahrenheit). It then ran long enough to produce five grams of oxygen. Thats not enough to breathe for very long. But the main reason to make oxygen on Mars isnt for breathing, Hecht points out. Its to make fuel for the return journey to Earth.

Future astronauts will have to either bring oxygen with them or make it on Mars. A rocket powerful enough to lift a few astronauts off the Red Planets surface would need about 25 metric tons (27.5 U.S. tons) of oxygen. Thats too much to pack along.

MOXIE is a prototype for the system astronauts could one day use to make rocket fuel. When running at full power, MOXIE can make about 10 grams of oxygen per hour. Powered by Perseverance, it will run for about one Martian day at a time. Hecht notes that a scaled-up version, however, could run nonstop for the 26 months before astronauts arrive.

MOXIE cant run full time now because it would use too much of Perseverances power. The rover has other instruments to run as it goes about its science mission, which is to search for signs of past life on Mars. MOXIE will get a chance to run at least nine more times over the next Martian year (about two Earth years).

The success of this system could set the stage for a permanent research station on Mars, something Hecht would like to see. Thats not something I expect to see in my lifetime, he admits. Still, he says, MOXIE brings it closer by a decade.

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The Perseverance rover split CO2 on Mars to make breathable air - Science News for Students

While most people arent tempted by offers of one-way tickets to Mars that come with built-in guarantees of dying a sad, lonely death on the empty red plains of a faraway planet, theres still a not-insignificant number of people out there who may like to offer their measly lives in tribute to Space Emperor Musk anyway. As loathe as we are to stand in the way of their sacrifice, it may still be a good idea to highlight some grim realities of Martian living that they might not be aware of.

Working from the assumption that the trip itself wont turn travelers into floating corpse balloons before they even get there, Mashable has outlined some of the cool ways to horrifically die on Mars in a new video.

In summary: You can die on Mars from all the water in your bodyincluding your precious urineboiling up. You can die from terrible cancers when Martian UV exposure quickly destabilizes your molecules. You can die from starvation because the planets soil is so toxic that its impossible to grow crops. You can die in a planet-wide, month-long dust storm consisting of incredibly strong winds that also suck up all available moisture. And, you can also die of good old-fashioned hypothermia since Mars is extremely cold. There are, the video explains, so, so many ways to die on the planet.

Sure, none of these terrible things may actually happen to people who head to Mars equipped with proper, well-tested and maintained safety equipment designed to withstand the its natural hostility. But, considering the kind of people currently most interested in getting people there, well, we wouldnt count on not dying in any number of awful accidents, even if they are preventable in theory.

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Fun video explains all the exciting ways humans can die on Mars - The A.V. Club

Symmetry in nature is pleasing to look at, and even more so when that symmetry is novel. Theres plenty of it to see on Earth, as biological processes have a penchant for patterns. But finding it off-world is trickier, and sometimes more striking. Which is why a picture from HiRISE of some Martian dunes is so spectacular.

The picture was actually taken back in 2010, inside of a crater in Noachis Terra, in the red planets southern hemisphere, around 38 degrees by -42.5 degrees in latitude / longitude. The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter HiRISE is riding along with was about 252 km above the planets surface when it snapped the image, which covers an area of about 25 square kilometers.

Even with that relatively large size, the image still resolves objects that are less than a meter in size. But the most striking feature of the pictures is the similarity between the dunes, which are actually the thin dark lines. The area between them, the slightly lighter reddish material, is covered in boulders that appear as dots in the image.

Mars and Earth arent the only worlds in the solar system with these fascinating types of dunes. In fact, Titan has the Solar Systems largest linear dune field. Maybe well get a glimpse of those in high resolution when Dragonfly makes a visit to Saturns largest moon in 2034.

Learn More:UA Dune SymmetryFlicker Dune Symmetry

Lead Image:Symmetric dunes on Mars.Credit: NASA / JPL / University of Arizona

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Dunes Trapped in a Crater on Mars Form This Interesting Pattern - Universe Today