Introduction:
In our solar system currently there is only one known planet that is habitable for living creatures, and that planet is Earth. For a planet to be habitable it must have the proper amount of water, nutrients, energy, a good atmosphere, and moderate temperature. Besides for Earth there is one planet that used to have all of these traits, called Mars. Mars is the only planet that has had rain, snow, eroded hills, filled basins, hosted chemistry, and glued sediments into rocks (Lakdawalla 2013). Mars is also the only other planet that potentially had bacteria-life living there billions of years ago (Hardin 2000). If Mars was habitable in the past what happened to the planet overtime that caused Mars to become this dry red planet we
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This will cause all of the carbon dioxide left in the atmosphere to react with the elements inside of the rocks on the planet, and would fuse to create a material called carbonate (Hardin 2000). Mars’ giant Tharsis volcanoes were able to keep the land of Mars wet and habitable (Lakdawalla 2013). Once these volcanoes erupted the atmosphere was able to form faster than the sun could destroy it when it was habitable (Lakdawalla 2013). Earth was able to get move the carbonate under the surface due to the shifting tectonic plates that were on this planet. Once this happened the carbon dioxide would go back into Earths atmosphere due to the volcanic eruptions that would occur (Hardin 2000). The difference with Mars is that it doesn’t have tectonic plats like Earth does, so the huge amounts of carbon dioxide would remain on the surface of Mars instead of being released back into the atmosphere. Even though there hasn’t been any recent volcanic activity, Mars is still not considered to be geologically dead like many moons because its heat is stored underground and there is a chance that the volcano can erupt eventually (Bennett 2005 Pg. 187). Because of this the atmosphere thinned out instead of being replenished like Earth’s atmosphere (Hardin …show more content…
This is due to the atmosphere disappearing either upwards or downwards (Carlisle 2014). If the atmosphere didn’t go downwards under the surface of mars the solar winds caused the atmosphere to deplete (Carlisle 2014). This has caused Mars to go from being a warm and wet planet to a cold dry planet around 3 billion years ago (Carlisle 2014). Back to what was state about Maven, is that Maven isn’t trying to find methane on the planet (Carlisle 2014). NASA put an orbiter called MOM to detect the different types of gases that are leaving high up the atmosphere (Carlisle 2014). Methane is the most common hydrocarbon in the solar system, but Mars is unstable when it comes to long time scales. Something must replenish the Methane and what Earth has to do this is biological activity (Carlisle 2014). MOM found out that the main elements that had been depleting within the atmosphere are hydrogen, oxygen, carbon, and argon (Carlisle 2014). Also, MOM was able to see that Mars’ atmosphere doesn’t have any methane currently (Lakdawalla 2013). What MAVEN found is that the rock samples on Mars had embedded fingerprints from the environment they were created (Carlisle 2014). The way that NASA was able to find this out was to have the mission planners decide when it would be the best time to orbit Mars. They found out that right after the solar cycle
This planet is about half the size of Earth, and the second smallest planet in our Solar system. Mars is usually known as the “Red Planet” because of its red color, which is due to the concentration of iron oxide and dust and rock covering its surface, yet it’s the main component is Carbon Dioxide. Mars has a very thin atmosphere, which leads to a wide range in temperatures because it cannot trap solar heat. Hence, Mars’ temperature is a lot colder than that of Earth’s, at about minus 80° Fahrenheit. Mars is home to the highest mountains and volcanoes in the Solar System, such as Olympus Mons (biggest volcano) and Valles Marineris (one of the largest canyons). Mars experiences seasons just like Earth, except that they are twice as long as that of Earth’s. The explanation for these giant mountains is Mars weak surface gravity. Mars has two known moons, Phobos, and Deimos. Mars is currently a very important target for NASA and other space exploration because it is the planet most prone to life, after Earth.
“I think humans will reach Mars, and I would like to see it happen in my lifetime” was said by Buzz Aldrin, a NASA astronaut. The former American aeronaut from Montclair, New Jersey believes that since Mars does exist, it is waiting to be reached by humans. When this would happen, he says that the human race would “evolve into a two-planet species.” Present day Mars has a lot of canyons, mountains and volcanoes. Even though the surface is Mars is very old, scientists learned about different younger rift valleys, plains, hills and ridges. According to recent reports, there were lakes and rivers, along with an ocean billions of years ago. The low temperatures on the planet cause there to be polar ice caps and frozen water present. Scientists continue to notice several discoveries on the planet that lead them to think there was once life on the planet. Different clues have scientists wanting to find out about even more. Many scientists in the past few centuries have been curious if life on Mars is possible or if it has ever been before.
The present atmosphere is greatly depleted in Ne, Xe and Kr which are inert gases that should be preserved in the atmosphere. This suggests that the earth’s initial atmosphere was lost early on either by boiling away during the magma ocean event or by being carried away by intense solar wind in the early solar system. At the end of the Hadean the present atmosphere and hydrosphere began to develop from volcanic emissions. It was during the proterozoic that a critical change occurred in the atmosphere, when it changed from a trace oxygen content of the Archean atmosphere to above 15% oxygen by 1800 mya.
Tracy K. Smith’s “Life on Mars” is a collection of poetry dealing mainly in the search for a sense of purpose and the nature of people. The books is something of an elegy as a whole with many poems pertaining to death and the author’s struggle with the loss of her father. The poems are at once poignant and gentle in tone and leave questions than can only be answered in multiple readings. The book is segmented in four parts that travel through different topics and types of poetry. The mood ranges from passionate accounts of Orwellian politics to soft recollections of a lovers embrace; throughout the book Smith brings in references to pop culture, science, and technology that incorporate seamlessly with her words.
Have you ever looked up in the sky and wondered if there is life elsewhere in the universe? Have you ever looked at a photograph of Mars and wondered if there really was ever life on it? People have a wide variety of opinions regarding these questions and with good reason. As far back as the broadcast of H. G. Well's novel, "The War of the Worlds", the world has been fascinated with the possibilities of what Mars may hold. Over time, the majority of people have come to realize that there is no way that life can currently be on Mars. Those who are uncertain think there may be microscopic bacteria underground.
Earth’s climate is determined by the physics and chemistry of its atmosphere. Earth’s atmosphere consists of four layers; troposphere which is closest to earth, stratosphere, mesosphere, and thermosphere. Hardy says, “During the past 100 years we humans, as a result of burning coal, oil, and gas and clearing forests, have greatly changed the chemical composition of the thin atmospheric layer.” There is more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere due to burning fossil fuels. The atmosphere is made up of many gases such as nitrogen, oxygen, and argon. It also consists of trace gases such as carbon dioxide, methane, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, chlorofluorocarbons and, ozone. The trace gases have the greatest effect on our climate (Hardy 5). Up to a certain level, these gases help to keep the planet warm by absorbing certain infrared wavelengths, so that there can be life on the planet. Thus, they trap heat in the troposphere and stop it from escaping to space (Hardy 7). Therefore, the greater amount of greenhouse gases, the more heat trapped in the atmosphere. Earth’s temperature is increasing due to increased levels of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide released into the air from burning fossil fuels. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 2001 report projects “global average surface temperature increases ranging from 1.4 to 5.8 degrees
Mars, the beautiful red planet, is the most similar planet to earth. The terrain in general is very close to what we are used to on earth, minus the vegetation. Earth and Mars both contain polar ice caps. Mars also has water throughout the planet, but it is mostly subsoil.
I agree with “Mars, Our Future on the red Planet” by Leonard David that sooner or later, a human being will leave the first footprint on Mars. This first footprint may merely be for the purpose of science, or it may be the establishment of a settlement for colonists. Elon Musk, a billionaire entrepreneur and founder of SpaceX has already made detailed plans for putting humans on Mars around 2025. He plans to build a gigantic shuttle capable of carrying hundreds of people at a time, stick it on top of a booster that is even more powerful than the Saturn rockets and launch it. The core stage would decouple and land vertically back at launch pad 39A in Cape Canaveral, Florida and the shuttle would unfurl its solar panels and glide millions of miles across the solar system.
Many astronomers now believe that Mars’ atmosphere was destroyed when Mars was about 800 million years old(Kluger, 2013). How it got destroyed is another big question. The most popular theory as of now is that Mars wasn't big enough so it lost its outermost layer due to lack of gravity. Large meteoroids constantly pounding down on Mars’ surface made it lose most of the atmosphere. Mars’ atmosphere is now one percent as thick as Earth's (Kluger, 2013).
In Aphra Behn's “The Rover,” characters define relationships as a type of economy where value and use are key. This time period commodified love and sexuality, valuing financial success over meaningful relationships. The dowry system made rich women with a high status most desirable for marriage and their value was increased by their honor. Typical of seventeenth century literature, Behn plays with this ideology as “the language of love in Restoration comedies frequently draws on the language of commerce.”1 She expresses her beliefs on the “'interest,' 'credit,' and 'value'”2 associated with love and sexuality through the different prices placed on her characters. Where Behn differs from other seventeenth century writers is that she does not give in to the “world dominated by male writers working in specifically misogynistic forms.”3 She gives women the authority within this economy. Instead of having very little power in their relationships with men, Behn allows women to be dominant. They can create their own value and control the amount of access men have to them. Characters such as Moretta and Angellica Bianca are not forced into submission by their desire for marriage, they “ignore[s] patriarchal structure and exhibit[s] no remorse.”4 They force men into submission through their manipulation of the economy of love and sexuality. Aphra Behn's characterization of Moretta and Angellica Bianca using the language of commerce gives them authority that other woman did not have access to.
In a recent interview with Bruce Jakosky, Ph.D., Professor of Geologic and Planetary Sciences at the University of Colorado, Linda Howe asked a series of questions pertaining to Mars and what had exactly happened to the planet. The first question was: Q.) “What might have Caused Mars to lose both its surface water and magnetic field?'; A.) “The CO2 that would have produced a greenhouse atmosphere could have been lost to space. It could have been incorporated into the ground as carbonate minerals, and once that happens, the water could have frozen out in the ground.
The amount of CO2 in a planet's atmosphere affects the temperature of the planet. As more and more CO2 builds up in the atmosphere, less heat can escape and the planet gets hotter. The CO2 traps radiation from the sun like a greenhouse. This is called global warming or the greenhouse effect. Global warming is becoming a serious problem and CO2 is the major cause. The earth is now warmer than it has been in 1000's of years. The amount of CO2 deposited in the earth's atmosphere from human activities is expected to double by the year 2050. It could possible increase by four in the future with developing countries, such as China, anxious to improve their standard of living.
it’s red color, and is often referred to as the red planet. What makes Mars look red?
absorbed. This will cause the atmosphere and the earth?s temperature to warm. The warming of
Terraforming Mars is the process of making mars hospitable to human life and colonizing a safe environment for people to live. Mars, in retrospect, is the most earth-like planet that resides in our solar system, therefore it is the best planet amongst those around earth for us to attempt to inhabit. I would choose to use a timeline of one thousand years to complete the inhabitation process. Most scientist’s timeline is between one hundred and one hundred thousand years, I believe one hundred is much too short and we would be moving to fast and possibly make a mistake along the way. One hundred thousand on the other hand is too long, earths population would be far too high and we would need another environment sooner. Mars has a good amount of resources available for us to use if we make it to mars, these include oxygen, nitrogen, and water.