Changing Mars' Atmosphere

KDubbs82 · 2007-06-27 13:29:50

This may be the aimless inquiry of a neophyte, but is it possible for something like a bomb to be sent to mars with certain materials (e.g. oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, etc.) in an extremely concentrated form..exploded in Mars' atmosphere and over time change the atmosphere and create opportunity for life? For example could the proportionate ingredients create a greenhouse effect on mars to warm the planet.

A subquestion that comes to mind is that would the martian atmosphere be able to hold all the gases sent?

Martian Republic · 2007-06-27 15:19:14

This may be the aimless inquiry of a neophyte, but is it possible for something like a bomb to be sent to mars with certain materials (e.g. oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, etc.) in an extremely concentrated form..exploded in Mars' atmosphere and over time change the atmosphere and create opportunity for life? For example could the proportionate ingredients create a greenhouse effect on mars to warm the planet.

No. Insufficient mass to be able to get the job done. That why several people on this web site have suggested using comet with the needed ingredients, but even then it would probably take several hundred to get the job done.

A subquestion that comes to mind is that would the martian atmosphere be able to hold all the gases sent?

Unknown, but several people have on this web site have suggested that it would dissipate over anywhere from several thousand years to hundreds of thousands of years. But, we really don't know how long Mars could hold onto that Atmosphere in it present form. There have been several suggestion as how to help Mars hold onto a denser atmosphere too by either or both use of magnetic confinement to generate magnetosphere like what around the Earth.

Larry,

SpaceNut · 2007-06-27 20:37:01

Topic moved to terraforming....from Human....

RobS · 2007-06-28 17:24:05

Mars would hold onto the atmosphere plenty long enough. After all, it has an atmosphere now after 4.5 billion years. If all the gas in the polar caps were released, they say the density would triple (this is a recent article on Space.com). That means when one remembers the lower gravity, Mars would have a tenth as much gas per square meter as Earth, and that ain't so bad.

The earth's atmosphere has a mass of ten metric tonnes per square meter. Imagine, ten tonnes--five times the mass of a small car--pushing down on every square meter of the earth's surface. That's a lot of air. Mars has 125 million square kilometers of surface. Each square kilometer has a million square meters. So do your own math; if you want to thicken the Martian atmosphere and you need a lot of air.

The best way to thicken the Martian atmosphere is probably to produce greenhouse gasses like chloroflorcarbons; even parts per million of them will raise the temperature. A higher temperature will cause the solid carbon dioxide caps to sublimate and gasses adhering to the soil particles will be released (because adhesion increases as temperatures drop). That may increase the atmosphere three or four fold, maybe more (no one really knows) and may make liquid water occasionally present. This approach would take a half century to a century, require a thousand or so dedicated workers, and use as much power as the city of Chicago.

The other, drastic solution would be to direct some icy bodies from the outer solar system toward the Martian caps and nuke them thoroughly a day or so before collision so that the caps would be hit by zillions of small particles, raising the temperature and "gardening" the outer surface thoroughly. That could double the atmosphere overnight, but in a thousand years or so it would re-freeze, and you probably would have to evacuate the entire population during the cataclysm.

-- RobS

RobertDyck · 2007-06-29 08:46:35

Chloroflorcarbons (CFCs) are a bad idea. Once you build an oxygen atmosphere, UV from sunlight will convert some oxygen to ozone (3 O2 -> 2 O3). Ozone will absorb UV better than oxygen, but that UV will convert zone back into oxygen. It will reach equilibrium where UV intensity on the surface of Mars is the same as Earth. As long as you don't do something stupid to destroy ozone; CFCs destroy ozone, that's why the were banned on Earth. PerFluoroCarbons (PFCs) also absorb InfraRed (IR) light, acting as greenhouse gas, but don't destroy ozone.

Chris McKay first proposed the idea of deliberately producing greenhouse gasses on Mars to warm it. However, as Martyn J. Fogg pointed out in his book "Terraforming: Engineering Planetary Environments" the ozone effect disqualifies CFCs. He proposed a mix of PFCs, each with a different IR absorption spectrum. PFCs are CF4, C2F6, C3F8, C4F10, etc. He also included SF6, a gas that absorbs middle spectrum IR. Although he downplays the importance of SF6, it has been identified as the most powerful greenhouse gas on Earth. It is 22,000 times as powerful as an equal mass of CO2.

UV intensity is much greater on Mars than Earth. Although sunlight intensity at Mars orbit is 45% that of Earth orbit, the thinner atmosphere means more gets down to the surface. There is an ozone layer on Mars, but it's rediculously thin. UV is separated into 3 bands: UV-A, UV-B, and UV-C. UV-a will give you a suntan or sunburn. UV-B is dangerous because it can cause skin cancer. Little UV-B makes it to the surface of Earth, but you do have to be careful on a bright, hot sunny day. No UV-C gets to the surface of Earth at all. UV-C is even higher frequency than UV-B, it will cause skin cancer with much less intensity than UV-B. Next up the frequency spectrum from UV-C is soft X-Ray. Mars has so much UV-B and UV-C that microorganisms cannot survive on the surface, it sterilizes Mars.

An opaque spacesuit will block all UV light, and the spectrally selective coating on helmet visors also blocks UV, but the goal of terraforming is to walk out on the surface without protective clothing.

Mark Friedenbach · 2007-06-29 10:25:56

How toxic are PFC's? It's not going to warm Mars only to create an unbreathable atmosphere is it?

RobertDyck · 2007-06-29 11:23:09

From Wikipedia

Perfluorocarbons are commonly used in eye surgery as temporary replacements of the vitreous humor in retinal detachment surgery.
...
PFCs are being used in refrigerating units and "clean" fire extinguishers.

It's so innert and safe it can be implanted in the body.

From this website:

In the 1960's, researchers discovered that there could be an alternative method for supporting injured lungs.
...
These liquids are clear, colorless, odorless, nonconducting, and nonflammable. ... The C-F bond is the strongest single bond encountered in organic chemistry, and its strength is further increased when several fluorine atoms are present on the same carbon atom. The presence of fluorine even reinforces the C-C bonds.
...
One PFC that is being used in the FDA clinical trials of liquid ventilation therapy is Perflubron or "LiquiVent®" by Alliance Pharmaceutical Corporation. (C8F17Br)

This is the stuff the US navy uses as breathing liquid for extremely deep dives. I think they don't use it any more, instead use a hard suit that maintains 1 atmosphere pressure, same as the surface. But the point is you can breathe liquid PFC, and it can be used as a temporary blood replacement. The gas would have small molecules, liquid has large molecules.

The only problem with PFC is it's a greenhouse gas that lasts 50,000 years in the atmosphere. On Earth that's bad, on Mars it's good. Tetrafluoromethane (CF4) is the smallest PFC; it's greenhouse warming potential is 6500 times CO2. Hexafluoroethane (C2F6) is 9200 times CO2. Each of these absorb a different spectrum of IR, so to warm Mars you want a mix of all of them.

Mark Friedenbach · 2007-07-02 10:55:41

Thanks Robert, that makes me feel much safer My inner environmentalist gets worried when I hear people talking about mass producing industrial pollutants on Mars, but I guess there's nothing to worry about here, safety-wise.

m1omg · 2007-07-03 12:26:39

Do not confuse CFCs with PCFs.
CFCs ("freons") are dangerous because they rapidly destroy ozone layer in extremely small quantities and they are the main case of the ozone hole and ozone depletion.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfluorocarbons
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haloalkane … 2C_HCFC.29

PFCs have nothing with industrial pollution, CFCs do.
And there would be needed only a very tiny amount of them (PFCs) to warm Mars so no danger, because they are about 9000x as powerful greenhouse gases as CO2.

m1omg · 2007-07-03 12:31:39

This may be the aimless inquiry of a neophyte, but is it possible for something like a bomb to be sent to mars with certain materials (e.g. oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, etc.) in an extremely concentrated form..exploded in Mars' atmosphere and over time change the atmosphere and create opportunity for life? For example could the proportionate ingredients create a greenhouse effect on mars to warm the planet.
A subquestion that comes to mind is that would the martian atmosphere be able to hold all the gases sent?

Yes it would.
http://www.transhuman.talktalk.net/iw/Geosync.htm .
The cause of today's think atmosphere is that it failed to entabilish about 1 bar atmosphere because of lowering volcanism over time, instead it had only 0.07 bar atm. from the beggining that did not have enoughly strong ionosphere that would protect that atmosphere when the mag. field collapsed.

But Mars's core is solidyfying so it will probably recreate mag. field over time - http://www.bautforum.com/showthread.php … e+freezing and so protect the atmosphere even more than ionosphere.

RickSmith · 2007-11-16 03:05:24

The cause of today's thin atmosphere is that it failed to establish about 1 bar atmosphere because of lowering volcanism over time, instead it had only 0.07 bar atm. from the begining that did not have enough strong ionosphere that would protect that atmosphere when the mag. field collapsed.

Hi mlomg, everyone.
Where did you see that Mars started with 0.07 Bars? When the solar system formed, the Sun had 70% of its current output and it is very hard to understand how Mars seems to have been warm and wet for its first billion years or so. I've read that they think that Mars started with about several Bars of mostly CO2. "Mars a Warmer Wetter Planet" page 103. Elsewhere I've read discussions of about 3 Bars of pressure at the planet's birth.

Warm regards, Rick.

New Mars Forums

Announcement

#1 2007-06-27 13:29:50

Re: Changing Mars' Atmosphere

#2 2007-06-27 15:19:14

Re: Changing Mars' Atmosphere

#3 2007-06-27 20:37:01

Re: Changing Mars' Atmosphere

#4 2007-06-28 17:24:05

Re: Changing Mars' Atmosphere

#5 2007-06-29 08:46:35

Re: Changing Mars' Atmosphere

#6 2007-06-29 10:25:56

Re: Changing Mars' Atmosphere

#7 2007-06-29 11:23:09

Re: Changing Mars' Atmosphere

#8 2007-07-02 10:55:41

Re: Changing Mars' Atmosphere

#9 2007-07-03 12:26:39

Re: Changing Mars' Atmosphere

#10 2007-07-03 12:31:39

Re: Changing Mars' Atmosphere

#11 2007-11-16 03:05:24

Re: Changing Mars' Atmosphere

Board footer