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Solar Wind Rips Up Martian Atmosphere

Posted by Soulskill on from the that-atmosphere-had-it-coming dept.

IHateEverybody writes "Scientists have found evidence that the solar wind is ripping off chunks of the Martian atmosphere, which could possibly explain why Mars has such a thin atmosphere today. The chunks are being ripped up along 'magnetic umbrellas,' which are bubbles of magnetic fields which rise from the ground and extend above the Martian atmosphere. This is surprising because scientists previously thought that these magnetic umbrellas protected the Martian atmosphere. Now it looks like exactly the opposite might be true."

5 of 101 comments (clear)

  1. Re:bad news for earth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    A magnetic field.

  2. At least.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    At least it's not ripping up Uranus.

  3. Re:bad news for earth? by SockPuppet_9_5 · · Score: 5, Informative

    As I understand it, the Earth's magnetic field is healthy and extends up past the bulk of our atmosphere. The pushing from the solar wind deforms our atmosphere, but any ripples or other magnetic eddies are considerably smaller and that possible "ripping" of an Earth eddy would take place pretty far above the planet. I might guess that the Earth's magnetic field is consistent enough to prevent any large eddies from forming in the first place.

  4. Re:bad news for earth? by WindBourne · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I would say that you are correct. The article is saying that the SMALL LIMITED mag fields on Mars allows, even encourages, the ripping. Our field encompasses the entire planet and prevents. I have wondered if the moon acting on our core is what makes it spin. As such, it would seem that pushing a large asteroid (perhaps ceres) around Mars would re-start its core spinning. Of course, that tech is out of our reach for a while, and we do not have enough data to know if something like that would work.

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  5. Re:But what about the "how" part . . . ? by meringuoid · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I'm not certain it's actually necessary to fix it. The atmosphere would be stripped away on a timescale of millions of years. If you're capable of terraforming Mars to begin with, you're capable of replacing lost air faster than the Sun can strip it away. It's probably cheaper to do that than to rig up some enormous artificial magnetic shield.

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    Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.