Mars: Our Celestial Companion

By Adam J Guterman

Mars is one of our closest planetary neighbors and most visible. It has captured the imagination of many astronomers for centuries. Mars was once seen as the fiery red planet, which dubbed it the God of War in ancient Roman mythology. In reality, the reddish appearance is actually due to iron oxide, and the planet is in fact extremely cold. Mars was first mapped-out in 1877 by Italian astronomer, Giovanni Schiaparelli. He first noted that channels were etched in the Martian topography. In the early Twentieth century astronomer, Percival Lowell, looking through his telescope saw the linear shapes carved into the planet’s surface and concluded that the lines were canals made by a race of Martians. That later proved to be incorrect, but ever since then Mars seems to capture the imaginations of human beings on earth. Mars has made a large impact on our present culture: science fiction writers feature it in their stories, movies are made about it, and Orson Wells actually created panic in parts of the 1930’s United States with his radio broadcast of “The War of the Worlds,” which featured invaders from that planet (Hearle, 2004).

Currently, Mars is attracting much attention from NASA as increasingly more missions are being performed and data sent back. According to Craig Freudenrich, the missions since the early 1970s: Mariner 9, Viking 1, Viking 2, and Pathfinder have toured the planet, sampled the minerals, surveyed the terrain, extensively mapped the surface, and sent back compelling pictures of its dry and dusty surface. The surface is divided into three parts: the Southern Highlands, the Northern Plains, and the Polar Regions. Its polar caps are made mostly of frozen carbon dioxide with a small amount of water ice. It also has a very weak magnetic field. The crust is thin and not broken into plates like the earth (Freudenrich, 2005).

Judging by the news of the last few years it seems that human beings are planning on getting there sooner or later. It is one of our nearest neighboring planets, and makes it a good choice for exploration. Our other closest neighbor is Venus. Unfortunately, Venus is not a good choice for human exploration or habitation as it has an extremely hot and toxic atmosphere; life could not last there long. Mars on the other hand is relatively less harsh and more accessible. Both planets are rocky and solid. They are part of a group known as the terrestrial planets (Hearle, 2004).














A comparison of Mars to Earth:

Earth:
• is the third planet from the sun.
• has one moon.
• is about twice the size of Mars.
• has a day lasting about 24 hours.
• has one year lasting 365 Days, Mars is about twice as long.
• has an average surface temperature that ranges between freezing and boiling water.
• has a climate that supports life.
• has a large amount of oxygen.
• has a larger atmosphere compared to Mars.
• has plate tectonics.
• has magnetism.
• has heat radiating from within its core.
• has a Greenhouse effect that captures solar radiation and holds heat from the atmosphere.
• has an ozone layer – Mars has none.
• has active volcanoes – Mars’ are inactive.
• has an ocean of water that covers more surface area than land.

Mars:
• is the fourth planet from the sun.
• has two moons, Deimos and Phobos.
• is little more than half the size of earth.
• has a mass of about one-ninth of earths.
• has a day lasting 24 hours and 37.4 minutes.
• completes an orbit of the sun in nearly two earth years.
• has temperatures ranging between 30°C in the day and -130°C at night (at the equator).
• does not have a climate that supports life (or at least not yet confirmed).
• has a very thin atmosphere, much smaller than earth’s.
• has a large amount of carbon dioxide, but very minute amounts of oxygen.
• has currently no oceans or free flowing water.
• has ice in its polar caps.
• has been thought to have an ocean long ago.
• is dry and dusty with very fast winds and no clouds.
• has great canyons 2,400 miles long called the Valles Marineris, which is greater than the distance from New York to Los Angeles.
• has the highest mountain in the solar system. An inactive volcano, Olympic Mons rises 16 miles above its surrounding base, compared to the biggest volcano on earth (Mauna Loa, Hawaii), which rises 6 miles above the ocean floor.


It has been speculated that Mars one day could be made habitable. Maybe sometime in the future, humans could colonize Mars and make it their second home. According to Kevin Bonsor, Mars could be transformed into a more earth-like climate through a process called terraforming. That would involve transforming the planet by warming it and creating an atmosphere. Some of the proposed methods include: large orbital mirrors to reflect sunlight and heat the surface, Greenhouse gas producing factories to trap solar radiation, smashing ammonia-heavy asteroids into the planet to raise the greenhouse gas level. An ambitious undertaking, it could take several decades or centuries to complete that process. NASA is also working on a solar sail propulsion system that involves the use of large mirrors to harness the sun’s power. It could propel a craft through space and makes a long distance space trip more efficient (Bonsor, 2005).


It seems that a lot of things are in the works at NASA involving the investigation of the planets. Mars, being one of our closest neighbors makes it a logical first choice for visiting. There are quite a few differences between our planets but also a lot of similarities. Can it be made habitable? Maybe. Mars seems to captures people’s imaginations, and inspires them to want to go to the next step.













References

Hearle, A. (Director), 2004. Eyewitness: Planets. [DVD series]. Wynnewood: Schlessinger Media.

Freudenrich C. (2005). How Mars Works. Retrieved, August 6, 2005, from http://science.howstuffworks.com/mars.htm/printable

Bonsor K. (2005). How Terraforming Mars Will Work. Retrieved, August 6, 2005, from http://science.howstuffworks.com/terraforming.htm/printable

Hewitt P., Suchoki J., & Hewitt L. (2004). Conceptual Physical Science. (3rd ed.). San Francisco: Addison Wesley.

Analysis of "The Day After Tomorrow"

By Adam J Guterman













In the film “The Day After Tomorrow,” the significance of the Global Oceanic Conveyor Belt's impact on earth's weather systems is portrayed in a shockingly extreme fashion. According to the main character, Professor Jack Hall, the North Atlantic Ocean's current has been disturbed by global warming and the temperature increase of the earth’s atmosphere is melting the polar ice caps and thus desalinating the oceans. The desalinization of the oceans creates a disruptive effect on the North Atlantic current which in turn adversely affects the Global Oceanic Conveyor Belt of the world’s oceans. Water levels start rising, flooding occurs, and other climatic disturbances occur all over the world as well. This sets the stage for a new Ice Age.

The significance of the scientists (paleoclimatologists) drilling ice cores is that they are studying the patterns of weather from the past – analyzing the layers of ice reveals the history of climate change.

The initial pieces of evidence that show a major climate change approaching are the unusual and extreme patterns of weather – ocean buoys reading abrupt temperature changes, changes in water level, flooding, birds – and other animals – becoming excited and fleeing, storms, cyclones, tornados, hurricanes, hail, and snow.

Regarding the type of storm system that caused the great global cooling – earlier in the movie they were talking about a cyclonic system that struck California’s coast. Later on the types of storm systems that caused the great blizzards were a series of three massive storms all over the world, which created blizzards in the northern hemisphere, and had eyes like that of a hurricane. Maybe the filmmakers were concocting a hybrid storm out of several real storm types. I’m not exactly sure what to call it – maybe a hurricane/cyclone: a fantasy storm.

The concept of "adiabatic warming" within the center of the storm is addressed in the movie. The scientist explains that the storm is pulling super cooled air down from the upper Troposphere. A second scientist is surprised by that because he expects the descending air to warm up. It has descend too rapidly, and instead of warming¬ – cools instead. This creates extreme, deadly cold air that immobilizes the helicopters, and freezes their crew. I’m doubtful about the science of this because I learned that it usually warms as it descends. I saw that as the make-believe part of the movie.

The scientists were talking about how deadly it would be to be outside during the storm in the northern part of North America. Then the main character decided not to take his own advice and searched for his son in New York City. I thought it was farfetched that he would have made it there on foot, given that this was likely one of the worst storm systems ever.

The scene where people are being instantly frozen solid from the incoming air was questionable. Would the air from a storm cause that rapid a change in temperature to freeze something on the ground? The movie made a point out of this because they implied that a wooly mammoth froze instantaneously in the last ice age, right in the middle of eating – with food still it its mouth. It sounds similar in effect to when something is dipped into liquid nitrogen. I’m not sure if that part was believable, but pretty amazing if it was.

Extremely large storm systems were shown in the pictures shot from space. For one of them to cover an entire continent at one time seem like a stretch. To have three of them covering major continents at once and then growing to engulf the entire world seems like an exaggeration. I don’t know enough about weather systems to say what is possible, but whenever I see satellite photos of storm systems they are usually much smaller than what was depicted.

It was an eye opening and thought provoking movie. What if some of the ideas presented in it turned out to be true? Or was it just a propagandist’s agenda? Global Warming issue is very politically and ideologically charged issue – so it’s hard for me say what’s true and what’s exaggerated without studying it further. The content of the movie seems somewhat similar to what I’ve read about global warming, and ice ages. Perhaps humanity needs to rethink its impact on the well-being of the planet and change what it does to prevent something like that from happening; maybe it takes a catastrophe to open people’s eyes.

If the filmmakers explained the storms and other anomalies in a little more detail that they did; it would have helped the viewer to understand the mechanisms of what was going on with the weather systems. It also would have been better to show what was happening in other places in the world. In that respect the first half was much better than the second half. After awhile it turned into a typical Hollywood style melodrama – the main character’s search for his son – and got bogged down on that sub-plot. I wanted to see a step-by-step cross section from various locations of the planet to put the whole storm story into perspective. Instead, the filmmakers decided to narrow their focus and turn it into a personal rescue story. Also, the way it ended didn’t seem right: The storm with its aftermath fading out, and humanity trying to return back to normal seemed too clichéd an ending. It just seemed like a typical movie ending pasted onto what would probably be a much more prolonged process. And when they had Professor Hall’s group of survivors outside trying to walk out of New York City over that huge pileup of snow, I thought the credibility was a bit thin there.

The characters in the movie breathed a sigh of relief as the storm passed and the president even gave a speech about how irresponsible he and society had been in the past, how we’ve learned from our mistakes, and look forward to the future. Ok, but what next? Did they think they were in the clear just because the big storm ended, or were their problems just beginning? How do they resolve the desalination of the Oceans, the Global Warming problem, the North Atlantic Current dilemma, the Global Oceanic Conveyor Belt issue, the impending Ice Age? They did not say. I think this movie raised a lot more questions than it could answer. But, it was good, in that it was very thought provoking and had a lot of interesting imagery. A good follow-up would be about what happens next to what's left of the planet in the months after the storm.

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The Day After Tomorrow. With Dennis Quaid. Dir. Roland Emmerich,
Twentieth Century Fox, 2004.