The average temperature on the surface of Mars is -60 degrees Celsius, and raising it by 28 degrees would be a huge change, allowing microorganisms and liquid water to exist over large areas of the planet.
What makes the new method unique is that it uses materials readily available on Mars. Previously proposed methods either involved importing materials from Earth or mining the Red Planet to extract rare metals.
It would take decades to warm the planet. Of course, this does not mean that people on Mars will be able to shed their spacesuits or breathe the local atmosphere. However, it would lay the foundations for such a development. It would allow for the existence of liquid water, the presence of microorganisms and the cultivation of plants that would gradually release oxygen into the atmosphere.
The key step toward making Mars more habitable is to turn up the temperature. You could do what humans have inadvertently done on Earth, releasing materials into the atmosphere that would amplify the natural greenhouse effect by keeping the sun’s energy close to the planet’s surface. The problem is that—whatever those materials are—you’ll need huge amounts of them. So far, proposals have called for either bringing in the gases from Earth or mining the necessary materials on Mars. Both are extremely expensive and difficult to do. The authors of the recent paper wondered whether some easily accessible, on-site material could be used to warm Mars.
We know from previous research that Martian dust is rich in iron and aluminum. These dust particles cannot heat the planet. Their composition and size would cool the Martian surface if they were released into the atmosphere.
Scientists hypothesized that if this dust had a different shape, it might increase, rather than decrease, global warming.
So they created rod-shaped particles the size of commercially available glitter. They’re able to trap the escaping heat energy and scatter sunlight toward the planet’s surface.
“The way light interacts with objects smaller than the wavelength is a fascinating topic. In addition, nanoparticles can be prepared in such a way that they exhibit optical effects that go beyond what we would expect from particle size alone. We believe it is possible to design nanoparticles that are more efficient, even those whose optical properties change dynamically,” says study co-author Ansari Mohseni.
Professor Edwin Kite adds that the proposed method would still require millions of tons of material, but it is still 5,000 times less than previous proposals. This means it is cheaper and easier to use. Heating Mars to the point where liquid water can exist on its surface is not as difficult as previously thought.Kate adds.
Calculations show that if these particles are continuously emitted at a rate of 30 liters per second, then over time the average temperature on the surface of Mars can rise by 28 degrees Celsius, and the first effects of such measures will be visible in just a few months. It is also possible to reverse the effect of global warming. It will be enough to stop the emission of particles and in a few years the situation will return to normal.
The authors of the proposal say more research is needed. For example, we don’t know exactly how fast the emitted particles spread through the atmosphere. In addition, Mars has water and clouds. As the atmosphere warms, water vapor can condense on the emitted particles and fall as rain. Climate feedbacks are very difficult to model. To implement our method, we will need more data from Mars and Earth. We also need to work slowly and make sure that the effects of our actions are reversible, and only then can we be sure that they have worked, Kite warns. Moreover, the scientist emphasizes, the researchers focused on aspects related to raising the temperature to a level that is beneficial for microorganisms and the possibility of growing plants, not on creating an atmosphere that people can breathe in.
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