Can we turn Mars into Earth 2.0?

in #physics7 years ago

Mars One is a project in which humans will be sent to Mars to develop a permanent settlement and colonize a completely new planet, essentially transforming it into another Earth. Is this possible? Let's discuss.

What are the conditions on Mars today?

  • Temperatures reach -60 degrees Celsius
  • It has un-breathable air composed of 95.97% Carbon Dioxide
  • It receives deadly doses of radiation due to not having an atmosphere

If you put 2 and 2 together, humans simply cannot live there; but could we use technology to change the conditions to terraform it? Terraforming is simply the Science of transforming a planet to support human life. What must need to be done to be able to achieve this?

Terraforming Mars into Earth 2.0

Mars would need an Earth like atmosphere

The history of Mars

Roughly 4 billion years ago, Mars had many similarities to Earth. It had an atmosphere and its soil absorbed Carbon Dioxide and Nitrogen. Active volcanoes then put them back into the atmosphere so the cycle repeated. Asteroids hitting Mars also kept it nice and warm. It also had a magnetic field which protected the atmosphere from being stripped away from the Sun's radiation.

Eventually the planet cooled and its magnetic field died down, volcanoes stopped erupting and asteroid collision rate went down. One thing that did not change is the martian soil continued to absorb the contents of the atmosphere, and solar winds stripped away what was left leaving Mars in the state we see it today.

How can we produce it a new atmosphere?

In simple terms, we must induce a massive Global Warming effect. Technology can be used to extract Carbon, Fluorine and Sulfur in its soil, convert them into greenhouse gases and pump them into the air.


Figure 1: A picture of Mars' south pole. Image shows dry ice which is frozen Carbon Dioxide

These greenhouse gases begin to trap heat from the sun, slowly warming up the south pole of Mars causing the sublimation of this dry ice. Sublimation is converting a solid directly into a gas. The result of this would help trap more heat from the Sun, which again, releases more greenhouse gases.

While this sounds like great news, it would take a long time. Besides that, these machines would need a lot of resources which are not readily available.

In that case, what else can we do?

Humans can build a machine which is effectively a huge mirror that they can put into Mars' orbit, which reflects sunlight onto its ice cap which would cause sublimation of this Carbon Dioxide, releasing it into the air.

Another way would be bombarding the planet with asteroids. Asteroids on the edge of the solar system can be captured and rocket engines can be used to propel them into Mars. There comes a problem with doing this though. This problem is that the power of this asteroid would be like a 70,000 megaton Hydrogen bomb striking its surface. This means if we were to do this, we must do it before humans land on the planet.

Now that we have an atmosphere, is that it?

Having just an atmosphere is not enough. This atmosphere would need an ozone layer to absorb some of the sun's Ultraviolet radiation which is dangerous to humans in high doses. To solve this, organisms can be introduced which release oxygen as a by-product eventually forming an ozone layer.

But what about Nitrogen? We would need to release Nitrogen to achieve an Earth like atmosphere. Bacteria could be used to extract trapped Nitrogen in the soil into the air or again, by using Asteroids.

Do we have an Earth 2.0?

Not quite. How would Mars hold on to this newly created atmosphere without a magnetic field. A magnetic field is needed to fend off solar winds from stripping it away. This is the biggest problem humans will encounter when attempting to terraform the planet. In fact, we don't quite know how to do that yet. On Earth, its core is made up of liquid metals which cause the magnetic fields. If we knew how to melt Mars' core which is solid metal, not liquid, it would bring back this magnetic field.

Mission would then certainly be accomplished. Bringing in water and plants would finish the job and it would only be a matter of time before humans would colonize what would now be known as Earth 2.0.

This video will help fill in some gaps in this article!

Please don't hesitate to look at my other posts. Some may end up interesting you!

Until next time, take care.

~ Mystifact

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We don't even know what mars is and the earth is flat: https://steemit.com/flatearth/@lasseehlers/flat-earth-the-earth-is-flat-research-it

So, the answer is not really relevant at this point in time.

Hey... Mars here.... please don't change me into earth... Jups will ram uranus if you do....

Screen Shot 2017-06-28 at 11.45.55 AM.png

This caught me off guard. I salute you my friend

Tell America mars has oil. :P

The amount of money needed to accomplish all theses things are astronomical. What people need to realize is the we have one earth and we need to make radical changes to keep in intact. With the amount of money used toward colonizing mars we could stop world hungry, have a world basic income and stop climate change before its too late. Once this is accomplished and our world is safe then we should branch out to try and colonize mars

Colonizing Mars I don't think we will ever see this in our lifetime but I'm sure that if anyone can do it's the people at NASA

lol NASA will never do anything because the USA only cares about killing brown-people in the middle east mate.

I like to think if it was up to the USA citizens we'd be spending 500+ Billion on space instead of destroying things in the developing world.

NASA could do incredible things but, off hand, thier budget is liek 3-4 Billion i think? Nothing compared to the money our leaders send to warfare inc.

Exactly, but sadly unless we overthrow the government that's never going to become a reality

That's going to take a lot of money. I don't think that We would ever see, in our lifetime people living in mars . I'm sure it can be done @mannyfig1956

I agree, it probably will be in the next 2 generations if it does end up happening!

Space is fake. Aliens are demons. It's the great deception. Don't be deceived.

But if aliens can live there, then human why not?

was starting to wonder what happen to all the talk about mars. I feel no matter what said, it is a money thing. NASA has always been about the money. Great information man. Thanks for the update. Cheers!

#follow4follow

Thanks for your comment. Money is always an issue but in this case time is also an issue. Besides even with the money, what we planned may not work accordingly as we have never done anything like this before!

It would be big to be living when they ever figure it out !

Yea ofc one day we can turn it like earth but I think it will be destroyed like our planet

I t does sound interesting. Still, I don't understand why anyone would want to divert time, money, and untold resources into making Mars habitable. Wouldn't this be better spent making Earth more habitable to all people? Meaning the countless impoverished and starving people of the world.

Just an idea...

The issue with that is you have people innovating in every area of life. Telling people to take that money and put that into more important things basically puts a lot of people and industries out of their jobs. I agree with you but the sad truth is it may never happen!

You're probably right about that, unfortunately.