A new study posits that climate change on Mars could have results in the barren wasteland that scientists know and study today.
says that ancient microbes could have been responsible for Mars’s climate change, leaving the planet a barren wasteland. Around 3.7 billion years ago, these ancient microbes would have been feeding on hydrogen and excreting methane into the Martian atmosphere. On Earth, similar microbes helped warm the atmosphere. On Mars, though, it cooled the atmosphere down.
This cooling, the researchers say, may have caused the ancient microbes to dig deeper within the surface of the planet, thereby causing the climate change on Mars that led to the planet’s barrenness today. And, because Mars is further from the Sun than Earth, it needed that warming effect of the greenhouse gasses to keep its heat in.
It’s an intriguing study that considers the differences between the atmospheres of Earth and Mars. Many believe and maybe even oceans spread out across its surface. One of the biggest issues with these climate changes on Mars, the study says, is tied to how the hydrogen reacted within the atmosphere.On Mars, hydrogen would have been a very potent warming gas because of a collision-induced absorption effect where carbon dioxide and hydrogen molecules interact with each other. The climate change on Mars was therefore caused by the replacement of one warming gas with another.
Methane is a much less potent warming gas. And, because these ancient microbes ate the hydrogen and then more methane was spewed out, the Martian surface became colder and colder. This, the study concludes, is what led to climate change on Mars, causing the rivers, lakes, and oceans to fade. Trapping anyWhether this intense change in the climate could be undone is another thing, though. Perhaps when NASA completes a, we’ll be able to learn more about the environment.
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Ancient Mars microbes triggered climate change that made it hard for them to surviveTereza is a London-based science and technology journalist, aspiring fiction writer and amateur gymnast. Originally from Prague, the Czech Republic, she spent the first seven years of her career working as a reporter, script-writer and presenter for various TV programmes of the Czech Public Service Television. She later took a career break to pursue further education and added a Master's in Science from the International Space University, France, to her Bachelor's in Journalism and Master's in Cultural Anthropology from Prague's Charles University. She worked as a reporter at the Engineering and Technology magazine, freelanced for a range of publications including Live Science, Space.com, Professional Engineering, Via Satellite and Space News and served as a maternity cover science editor at the European Space Agency.
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