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Research Suggests Mars Once Had a Thick Atmosphere
astroengine writes "At one time, Mars had a thick, protective atmosphere — possibly even cushier than Earth's — but the bubble of gases mostly dissipated about 4 billion years ago and has never been replenished, new research shows. The findings come from NASA's Mars rover Curiosity, which has been moonlighting as an atmospheric probe as it scours planet's surface for habitats that could have supported ancient microbial life. 'On Earth, our magnetic field protects us, it shields us from the solar wind particles. Without Earth's magnetic field, we would have no atmosphere and there would be no life on this planet. Everything would be wiped out — especially when you go back 4 billion years. The solar wind was at least 100 times stronger then than it is today. It was a young sun with a very intense radiation,' Chris Webster, manager of the Planetary Sciences Instruments Office at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., told Discovery News. Unfortunately for Mars, the last 4 billion years have not been kind."
What is this new page formatting where things follow you as you scroll called?
Are we sure of that? While I can accept that Mars lost its atmosphere due to the solar wind stripping it, it should also be noted that Venus has a very weak magnetic field, yet it has a far larger atmosphere than the Earth. In fact, most of the magnetic field of Venus comes from the solar wind interacting with the atmosphere.
We need to put boots on Mars
If we're going to terraform mars, I say we should go big.
Collide Mars and Venus together, that gets you a planet that's 92% of the mass of the Earth. Maybe add Mercury in there as well, that gets you 98%.
Move to an appropriate orbit and wait for it to cool... ;)
With the violence of the impact, you should be able to get a magnetic field going. I figure that the collision that created the earth & moon is what kickstarted ours.
I don't read AC A human right
Basically they start with the assumption that mars once had had free-flowing water.
That implies that the atmosphere should have had higher partial pressure than exists today (otherwize there wouldn't be any free flowing water).
This was not their research.
Given that assumption. These researchers looked at the profile of isotopes in the air and the ground and noted that the atmosphere isotopes skewed heavier than the models of dissolved gasses in the ground from other parts of the solar system. Then they hypothesized that if there was a thicker atmosphere at one time and was dissipated, the lighter isotopes would escape from the top of the atmosphere, leaving the heavier isotopes ratio in the thinned atmosphere. And they observed that this was true so it was consistent with this assumption.
Of course the original assumption about water may or may not be true. Or the composition of the dissolved gasses in the ground may or may not be true. Or the mechanism of lighter isotopes escaping from the top of the atmosphere may or may not be true. At best this is indirect circumstantial supporting evidence of a thick atmosphere hypothesis. Sadly NASA researchers trump up these things for the press to get ahold of (e.g., the ever reoccurring life-on-mars press announcements over the years).
I think we all know what happened to the atmosphere on Mars, and how to replenish it. We just need to find the reactor. See you at the part, Richter!
How did Mars form an atmosphere in the first place if it has no magnetic field to keep it from getting stripped away?
I'm pushing the limits of the google translator, but where we go.
I believe Mars was once equal to Earth: Dense enought atmosphere, oceans of water on the surface, and even a magnetic field protecting the atmosphere. But, some day long, long ago this happened, and caused the equivalent of Armageddon on the planet and turned him into what we know today. A "killed" planet.
Religion: The greatest weapon of mass destruction of all time
Is that something quite like it might actually be going on!
I myself would have thought it insane not too long ago, but the way world leaders are systematically and purposely messing up the planet with flouride, GMOs, cancer adjuvants, and so many other things that seem meant for the specific purpose of destroying the human population, it doesn't make any sense to any rational human being. But what if this is being carried out for other-than human beings? What if they really DO want us all dead, so they can take the world for themselves?
The other creepy thing is that this same theme has played out in so many other movies.. "They Live," "Body Snatchers," "Oblivion," it's all basically the same thing. And you look at the Bilderbergers and what they are doing, and how it is becoming more and more apparent that there is a globalist "elite" that really pulls the strings out there, and we seem to hear that they are worshiping demons and such, but that they have an odd code of honor that they must tell people what they are going to do before they do it... this makes these films all the creepier. Are they a message? Maybe.
Listen to David Icke. He will sound like an absolute fruit loop at first, but more and more of what he says is beginning to make sense.
discussion -- http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0115571/board/threads/
movie -- http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0115571/
The Arrival ((1996))
CAN you FEEL THAT BUDDY? huh huh huh?
were there midgets on Mars carrying machine guns?
Mars is trapped in its orbit and will remain there for the foreseeable future. It will still be there once we have developed the new energy solutions we need on this planet.
Mod up.
I object to power without constructive purpose. --Spock
Get your ass there.
Mars is trapped in its orbit and will remain there for the foreseeable future. It will still be there once we have developed the new energy solutions we need on this planet.
What application is demanding the development of new energy solutions? Right now ALL OF OUR EGGS ARE IN ONE BASKET. Solving the extinction problem should be priority #1. You call yourself Sentient?! Get your ass to Mars. Damn, we can't be ANY more blunt than that! The dinosaurs! Think!
So, here you are, with a space program. You've got a HUGE fabulous moon that's easy to see and get to that's got the same chemical composition of your planet, and a nice deep crater at the south pole to hang out in from solar storms. The next planet out has more gravity but has no magnetic field or atmosphere, but it's got resources you can use... PERFECT trial grounds for learning how to survive in deep space. Beyond that, there's a huge asteroid field with abundant resources for building things in space without the gravity tax, including Ceres a dwarf planet made of ice and rock... Ice = water = hydrogen & oxygen... grrrrr. Next we have a HUGE Gas Giant to study gravitational effects without getting burnt by the sun. In the solar system you just happen to find yourself in there are beautiful ringed worlds further out, and There's ice moons and moons full of methane, and... And... AND.
calm, stay calm...
And this puny minded ape wants to JUST SIT THERE?! You let defected pieces of shit like this survive among you?! You'll NEVER solve the Fermi Paradox at this rate!
There is not a single thing in this summery that has not be talked about extensively in 20 year old documentaries.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
This article seems to be alluding to the solar wind stripping Mars's atmosphere away. Wasn't there just a study a few months ago showing that the effects of solar winds on a planetary atmosphere are not nearly as significant as was once believed, and that there is almost no way that the solar wind alone could be responsible for the Martian atmospheres losses. Personally I'd trust that data a lot more as I think it was based on current measurements of the effects of the solar wind on the Martian atmosphere, not extrapolations from microscopic amounts of materials found in Martian meteorites that likely went through extreme events getting here (being blown off of Mars, spending years, decades, centuries and even eons in space, and then atmospheric reentry) that could have altered their chemistry. My two cents on the whole thing is most of the Martian atmosphere is probably still on Mars, tens, hundreds or even thousands of miles below the surface. Most people don't conceive of how narrow a margin we cling to life on this spinning ball of mud floating on a sea of lava. If you took a basketball and laid a single sheet of paper on its surface that width is far more than the area in which humans can survive without supplemental support systems. As the planets interior cooled the atmosphere may have retreated into the crust, on Earth this is prevented the elements in question (water, nitrogen, oxygen) tend to be ejected by Earths interior in a variety of ways (geysers, volcanoes, fissures) because of their tendency to expand when they come into contact with heat. On Mars as the planet cooled the atmosphere could have leaked through fissures and permeable areas in the crust as the internal temperatures were no longer able to keep it near the surface. This could open interesting possibilities for colonization, as to retrieve significant amounts of atmosphere, water and other necessary components future colonists may only need to sink "wells" deep enough to reach those deposits. Microbial life may even have followed these life sustaining elements into the planets crust as they retreated over the eons.
Mars was once a thriving world.
Its citizens became decadent, and they turned their technology on each other in a final war.
A few brave ones came to earth and made it resemble their erstwhile home, which they could observe through telescopes in its final nuclear holocaust.
Futurist Traditionalism
Here's the problem with your theory: Assuming aliens who could travel across the stars would even need to come to Earth (rather than, say, a perfectly habitable planet closer to home), a handful of custom viruses-that I suspect we could make ourselves-could wipe out the entire human race.
I suggest the atmospheric containment system of the planet Druidia.
Listen to David Icke. He will sound like an absolute fruit loop at first, but more and more of what he says is beginning to make sense.
So you are saying his paranoia is infectious?
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
And what if they would be susceptible to the virus too?
Or they don't want to kill off the whole human race, just parts.
It was the SUV's on mars wasn't it
This is nothing more than scientist getting millions and millions of government dollars for the sole purpose of trying to prove evolution. Further, the whole Mars exploration is to try to prove that there is no God. The end of every evolutionist's life immediately proves them wrong.
All of this Mars waste could be used to replenish our aging satellites. What an absolute waste.