Paul M. Sutter (opens in new tab) is an astrophysicist at SUNY (opens in new tab) Stony Brook and the Flatiron Institute, host of Ask a Spaceman (opens in new tab) and Space Radio (opens in new tab), and author of How to Die in Space (opens in new tab).
Almost every sci-fi story begins (and sometimes ends) with the terraforming of Mars to turn it into a more hospitable world.
But with its frigid temperatures, remoteness from the sun and general dustiness, changing Mars to be more Earth-like is more challenging than it seems (and it already seems pretty tough).
Incredible technology: How to use 'shells' to terraform a planet
The thing is, Mars used to be cool. And by cool, I mean warm. Billions of years ago, Mars had a thick, carbon-rich atmosphere, lakes and oceans of liquid water, and probably even white fluffy clouds. And this was at a time when our sun was smaller and weaker, but occasionally much more violent than it is today in other words, our solar system is a much more favorable place for life now than it was 3 billion years ago, and yet Mars is red and dead.
Sadly, Mars was doomed from the start. It's smaller than Earth, which means it cooled off much faster. The core of our planet is still molten, and that spinning blob of iron-rich goo in the center of Earth powers our strong magnetic field. The magnetic field is a literal force field, capable of stopping and deflecting the solar wind, which is a never-ending stream of high-energy particles blasting out of the sun.
When Mars cooled off, its core solidified and its magnetic force field shut off, exposing its atmosphere to the ravages of the solar wind. Over the course of 100 million years or so, the solar wind stripped away the Martian atmosphere. When the air pressure dropped to near-vacuum, the oceans on the surface boiled away and the planet dried up.
It's so tantalizing: Mars was once Earth-like, and so is there any way to bring it back to its former glory?
Thankfully (or unfortunately, depending on your point of view), we humans have plenty of experience in warming up planets. Inadvertently, through our centuries of carbon emissions, we've raised the surface temperature of Earth (opens in new tab) through a simple greenhouse mechanism. We pump out a lot of carbon dioxide, which is really good at letting sunlight in and preventing thermal radiation from escaping, so it acts like a giant invisible blanket over Earth.
The increased heat encourages moisture to leave the oceans and play around as a vapor in the atmosphere, which adds its own blanketing layer, adding to the increase in temperature, which evaporates more water, which warms the planet more, and before you know if prime beachfront property is now better suited as an underwater submarine base.
But if it works on Earth, maybe it could work on Mars. We can't access the OG Martian atmosphere, because it's completely lost to space, but Mars does have enormous deposits of water ice and frozen carbon dioxide in its polar caps, and some more laced just underneath the surface across the planet.
If we could somehow warm the caps, that might release enough carbon into the atmosphere to kick-start a greenhouse warming trend. All we would need to do is kick back, watch and wait for a few centuries for physics to do its thing and turn Mars into a much less nasty place.
Unfortunately, that simple idea probably isn't going to work.
Related: What would it be like to live on Mars?
The first issue is developing the technology to warm the caps. Proposals have ranged from sprinkling dust all across the poles (to make them reflect less light and warm them up) to building a giant space mirror to put some high-beam action on the poles. But any ideas require radical leaps in technology, and a manufacturing presence in space far beyond what we are currently capable of (in the case of the space mirror, we would need to mine about 200,000 tons of aluminum in space, whereas we are currently capable of mining well, zero tons of aluminum in space).
And then there's the unfortunate realization that there isn't nearly enough CO2 locked up in Mars to trigger a decent warming trend. Currently Mars has less than 1% of the air pressure on Earth at sea level. If you could evaporate every molecule of CO2 and H2O on Mars and get it into the atmosphere, the Red Planet would have 2% of the air pressure on Earth. You would need twice as much atmosphere to prevent the sweat and oils on your skin from boiling, and 10 times that much to not need a pressure suit.
Let's not even talk about the lack of oxygen.
To counter this lack of easily accessible greenhouse gases (opens in new tab), there are some radical proposals. Maybe we could have factories devoted to pumping out chlorofluorocarbons, which are a really nasty greenhouse gas. Or maybe we could shove in some ammonia-rich comets from the outer solar system. Ammonia itself is a great greenhouse blanket, and it eventually dissociates into harmless nitrogen, which makes up the bulk of our own atmosphere.
Assuming we could overcome the technological challenges associated with those proposals, there's still one major hurdle: the lack of a magnetic field. Unless we protect Mars, every molecule that we pump (or crash) into the atmosphere is vulnerable to getting blasted away by the solar wind. Like trying to build a pyramid from desert sand, it's not going to be easy.
Creative solutions abound. Maybe we could build a giant electromagnet in space to deflect away the solar wind. Maybe we could girdle Mars with a superconductor, giving it an artificial magnetosphere.
Naturally, we don't have nearly the sophistication to realize either of those solutions. Could we ever, possibly, terraform Mars and make it more hospitable? Sure, it's possible there's no fundamental law of physics getting in our way.
But don't hold your breath.
Learn more by listening to the episode "Could we really terraform Mars? (opens in new tab)" on the Ask A Spaceman podcast, available on iTunes (opens in new tab) and on the Web at http://www.askaspaceman.com (opens in new tab). Ask your own question on Twitter using #AskASpaceman or by following Paul @PaulMattSutter (opens in new tab) and facebook.com/PaulMattSutter (opens in new tab).
Go here to read the rest:
Could we really terraform Mars? | Space
- Best Sci-Fi Board Games In 2024 - TheGamer - April 18th, 2024 [April 18th, 2024]
- Elon Musk's 'Multiplanetary' Civilization Doesn't Offer Real Hope - The Federalist - November 26th, 2023 [November 26th, 2023]
- NASA's Perseverance rover successfully completes its oxygen ... - East Coast Daily (English) - September 9th, 2023 [September 9th, 2023]
- 18 Board Games That Everyone Needs To Play - Kotaku Australia - September 9th, 2023 [September 9th, 2023]
- The 15 Best Transformers Ripoffs - MovieWeb - September 9th, 2023 [September 9th, 2023]
- Godzilla Stomps Onto Television With 'Monarch' Trailer - ScreenCrush - September 9th, 2023 [September 9th, 2023]
- How to terraform Mars, without nukes, on a budget - Freethink - May 31st, 2023 [May 31st, 2023]
- Experience the future of sci-fi strategy gaming: 'Space Gears ... - msnNOW - May 31st, 2023 [May 31st, 2023]
- Terraforming Mars - Apps on Google Play - March 31st, 2023 [March 31st, 2023]
- The Definitive Guide To Terraforming - Universe Today - January 31st, 2023 [January 31st, 2023]
- How Terraforming Works | HowStuffWorks - January 31st, 2023 [January 31st, 2023]
- How Do We Terraform Mars? - Universe Today - January 31st, 2023 [January 31st, 2023]
- How to save the planet in less than two hours | Mint - Mint - October 17th, 2022 [October 17th, 2022]
- Elon Musk Floats 'Nuke Mars' Idea Again | Space - October 17th, 2022 [October 17th, 2022]
- Farting spaceships and the terraforming of Mars - Sify - October 15th, 2022 [October 15th, 2022]
- Dubai Future Forum begins with focus on society and space - The National - October 15th, 2022 [October 15th, 2022]
- Breakthrough - Surviving Mars Wiki - Paradox Wikis - October 6th, 2022 [October 6th, 2022]
- Why is there no Planet B? (commentary) - Mongabay.com - September 27th, 2022 [September 27th, 2022]
- The Fallout Of Warworld Across The DC Universe, Today (Spoilers) - Bleeding Cool News - September 27th, 2022 [September 27th, 2022]
- How to Teach Someone a Board Game (and Even Have Fun Doing It) - The New York Times - September 20th, 2022 [September 20th, 2022]
- X-Men Monday #172 - Steve Foxe Reflects on 'X-Men '92: House of XCII' AIPT - AIPT - September 20th, 2022 [September 20th, 2022]
- Lord Martin Rees: 'Long term, humans won't exist they'll evolve into something digital' - The Telegraph - September 20th, 2022 [September 20th, 2022]
- Book review: 'How the World Really Works' | Community | bgdailynews.com - Bowling Green Daily News - August 29th, 2022 [August 29th, 2022]
- Why Did Ferns Persist When All Other Plants Perished? - The Scientist - August 15th, 2022 [August 15th, 2022]
- Cardboard Cinema: LOTR, American Psycho, The World Series Of Board Games, And Zine Quest - /Film - August 15th, 2022 [August 15th, 2022]
- Marvel Reveals the Moment Before the X-Men Suffer a Planetary Mutant Massacre (Exclusive) - ComicBook.com - July 31st, 2022 [July 31st, 2022]
- How humans may populate the universe in the billions of years ahead - The Spectator - July 17th, 2022 [July 17th, 2022]
- Terraforming of Venus - Wikipedia - July 13th, 2022 [July 13th, 2022]
- Colonize the Red Planet with the Terraforming Mars board game, now 45% off - Space.com - July 13th, 2022 [July 13th, 2022]
- Want to know California's future? You can see it in the Sierra - San Francisco Chronicle - July 13th, 2022 [July 13th, 2022]
- The Untold Truth Of General Zod - Looper - June 15th, 2022 [June 15th, 2022]
- Terraformers Early Access Review One of the Finest Martian Games on Earth - The Workprint - June 11th, 2022 [June 11th, 2022]
- Bitcoin Mining In The 22nd Century - Bitcoin Magazine - June 11th, 2022 [June 11th, 2022]
- Sins Of The Black Flamingo Thank FOC It's Saturday, 4th of June 2022 - Bleeding Cool News - June 11th, 2022 [June 11th, 2022]
- Free to grab: Far Cry 4 and more games with Amazon Prime Gaming - guru3d.com - June 1st, 2022 [June 1st, 2022]
- The best Memorial Day sales we can find on gadgets, games, and tech gear [Updated] - Ars Technica - June 1st, 2022 [June 1st, 2022]
- Free to grab: Bioshock: The Collection at Epic Games Store - guru3d.com - June 1st, 2022 [June 1st, 2022]
- Early Memorial Day deal: get 33% off the Terraforming Mars board game - Space.com - May 25th, 2022 [May 25th, 2022]
- Todays best deals: iPad Air, recommended board games, and gaming mice - Ars Technica - May 23rd, 2022 [May 23rd, 2022]
- Why Is Board Gaming So White And Male? I'm Trying To Figure That Out - Kotaku Australia - May 23rd, 2022 [May 23rd, 2022]
- Five Stories in Which Aliens Attempt to Reshape the Earth - Tor.com - May 23rd, 2022 [May 23rd, 2022]
- Android app deals of the day: Terraforming Mars, Green Project, Fenix 2 for Twitter, more - 9to5Toys - May 13th, 2022 [May 13th, 2022]
- Get the Terraforming Mars video game for free right now from Epic Games - Space.com - May 13th, 2022 [May 13th, 2022]
- 11 best solo board games that can be enjoyed by one-player - The Independent - May 13th, 2022 [May 13th, 2022]
- Terraforming Mars is free on the Epic Games Store - Destructoid - May 6th, 2022 [May 6th, 2022]
- Vampire the Masquerade - Bloodhunt: What Are The Best Features Of Nosferatu Prowler? - The West News - May 6th, 2022 [May 6th, 2022]
- Games Inbox: Zelda: Breath Of The Wild 2 performance worries - Metro.co.uk - May 6th, 2022 [May 6th, 2022]
- Bleach Brave Souls: What Are The Best Beginner Tips? - The West News - May 6th, 2022 [May 6th, 2022]
- Terraforming Mars will be free on the Epic Games Store next week - For The Win - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- Bugsnax: How To Find The Trip Shot? - The West News - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- Rogue Legacy 2: How To Find All The Lilies Of the Valley? - The West News - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- Final Fantasy 14: How To Find The Radiant Twine? - The West News - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- Globle Game Answer Today May 3, 2022 - The West News - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- PUBG: How To Use Emotes On PC And Mobile Phones? - The West News - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- Vampire The Masquerade - Bloodhunt: What Are The Best Tips To Be A Vampire? - The West News - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- Skyrim: How To Find The Quarried Stone? - The West News - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- Dungeons & Dragons: What Are The Best Tiefling Bloodlines? - The West News - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- Skyrim: How To Find The Daedric Horse? - The West News - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- Heardle Answer For Today May 3 Tuesday - The West News - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- Skyrim: How To Be A Part Of The Thieves Guild? - The West News - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- Could space-going billionaires be the vanguard of a cosmic revolution? - The Guardian - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- Animal Crossing New Horizons: How To Get Ruby? - The West News - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- Globle Game Answer Today April 29, 2022 - The West News - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- Powerball Winning Numbers of April 30, 2022 - The West News - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- Animal Crossing: What Is New Horizons May Day? - The West News - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- 10 best solo board games that can be enjoyed by one-player - The Independent - May 3rd, 2022 [May 3rd, 2022]
- What is the temperature on Mars? | Space - April 20th, 2022 [April 20th, 2022]
- Per Aspera expands ocean terraforming with Blue Mars expansion - PC Gamer - April 20th, 2022 [April 20th, 2022]
- Teburu could be the future of board games that gamers actually want - TechRadar - April 20th, 2022 [April 20th, 2022]
- 'X-Men Red': on terraforming, climate change, and collective will - AIPT - April 6th, 2022 [April 6th, 2022]
- The UAEs plan to terraform Mars could also transform its own desert nation - The Independent - April 6th, 2022 [April 6th, 2022]
- Why is board gaming so white and male? I'm trying to figure that out - The Conversation - March 31st, 2022 [March 31st, 2022]
- Terraform a planet in this survival game that looks like Subnautica on Mars - PC Gamer - March 29th, 2022 [March 29th, 2022]
- All The Ways Living On Mars Could Kill You - 2oceansvibe News - March 29th, 2022 [March 29th, 2022]
- 10 Things You Didnt Know About The Sega Genesis Dragon Ball Z Game - Verve Times - March 18th, 2022 [March 18th, 2022]
- Moon Knight Faces His Greatest Test... The Truth - Marvel.com - March 17th, 2022 [March 17th, 2022]
- Curious Kids: could we change other planets in the Solar System so we could live on them? - The Conversation UK - February 24th, 2022 [February 24th, 2022]
- Curious Kids: Could we change other planets in the solar system so we could live on them? - The Indian Express - February 19th, 2022 [February 19th, 2022]
- Ada Palmer and the Weird Hand of Progress - WIRED - February 11th, 2022 [February 11th, 2022]
- The Live A Live Remake Gives Us Hope That These Japan-Only Square Enix Classics Will Make it West - PlayStation LifeStyle - February 11th, 2022 [February 11th, 2022]