 March 2, 2010 - 12:55pm | I have been pondering terraforming. I am of the understanding that a reason Earth can maintain an atmosphere and Mars can not is due to our strong magnetic field created by the convection of our molten core. Mars lacks a strong magnetic field and thus is unshielded from the solar wind and it can not build up an atmosphere because it gets blown away. Is this correct? If so, is there a viable way to create a sufficient electromagnetic field as part of a terraforming project? -iggy -iggy |
 March 2, 2010 - 1:55pm | That and lack of volcanic activity, plate tectonics, proximity to the home star to name a few others. Star Wars engineers or COBRA could help ya make a electro-field generator. :-P Might be beyond the frontier technology - or could be stolen from the Clicks. Maybe its an artifact!!!  Feel free to make one up, it would need a power source equal to the output of the field (unless it amplifies power), IMO. Consider the following table. Technology Level Table
Tables are just the way w00t r0lls!  |
 March 2, 2010 - 3:48pm | Another part of why Mars can't hold on to a thicker atmosphere is that it has only 1/3 the gravity of earth. Thus it is easier for the gas molecules to escape. I'll ask my wife (she's the planetary astronomer in the family  ) but I don't think that the magnetic field has much effect. It does have some as it does defelect the solar wind but Venus has no magnetic field to speak of (at least 100,000 times smaller than the Earth's) and it's atmosphere is 90x denser than Earth's plus it's hotter (so the gas particles can escape easier given the same ~1g of gravity). So it's not the dominant effect.Primarily it is a combination of atmopheric composition, planetary gravity and atmopheric temperature. If the atmopheric temperature is high enough that the average velocity of the air molecules is close to (or exceedes) the escape velocity for the planet (based on it's mass and size) then the atmophere will just bleed off into space. If the temperature is low enough so that the air molecules are much slower than the escape velocity, the atmophere sticks around. Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
March 2, 2010 - 5:35pm | Ah, you have sparked my memory. The magnetic field is important to shield life from the extra radiation it would get without it. The atmosphere is determined by gravity and temperature as you describe. What kind of life would survive on an Earth-like world without a magnetic field? -iggy -iggy |
 March 2, 2010 - 7:01pm | Concerning terraforming: Asimov wrote a novel called, "The Sands of Mars" that involved terraforming of mars It did include an attempt done on the sly by the mars colony to turn one of its moons into a miniature sun, the project had been forbidden my "mission control" back at earth (obstensibly because it was judged to require too much in resources)- the whole process was based off some theory from the 50's or 60s I guess. I dont know if the theory behind that is still plausible but I especially liked the political ramifications- the colony's governor was called back to earth to answer for his actions and it seemed that Earth was pissed that they did this because it made the mars colony even more independent from Earth. You might want to check out the whole Red Mars, Green Mars, Blue Mars series of books by Ben Bova? I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 March 3, 2010 - 11:51am | Gravity is the major factor in determining whether an atmosphere can remain on a plenet, as Terl said. Life without a magnetic field ... . I don't know, seems like you could develop life forms that had a high degree of mutations along their evolutionary track until such time as their genetic code formed in a way that prevented (or healed) damage caused by extended periods of high radiation/radiation damage. Their DNA (or whatever they would have that would be their version of DNA) could have many more times the amount of junk DNA humans have (indicating countless mutational strands acquired over a long term evolution on a high radiation world). ADVENTURE SEED Federation discovers low technolgoy, sentient race on such a world. They exhibit high degree of radiation resistance and the seem to be able to repair DNA damage due to radiation on a cellular level. Many organizations attempt to harvest these beings for study in order to determine how to produce medications/treatments to reverse radiation damage and, perhaps, aging. In breaking up one of these black labs, the characters discover that the DNA code of the beings is far too short to have evolved on such a high radiation world. Were they transplanted? Does the system primary enter periods of higher and lesser radiation emissions? How did these beings develop radiation resistance? Are they modified beings? etc ... DISCLAIMER some of the radiation resistance ideas comes from West End Games Aliens RPG... |
 March 3, 2010 - 1:28pm | Or you could cheat and just cook up a way to get Mars a molten core once again to give it a magnetic field. Then just ship huge amounts of green house gases from Venus and before long both worlds are useable. Just kidding, there's no logic to my reason. But I thought it just sounded good. In every age, in every place, the deeds of men remain the same. |
 March 3, 2010 - 4:51pm | I remember reading a Star Trek book that mentioned pushing comets into planets at angles so as to increase the rate of spin to increase the magnetic field, and provide additional water as well. Probably not terribly realistic, but it sounds good. "Rome didn't build an empire by having meetings. They did it by killing those who stood in their way." |
 March 3, 2010 - 5:08pm | Or you could cheat and just cook up a way to get Mars a molten core once again to give it a magnetic field. Then just ship huge amounts of green house gases from Venus and before long both worlds are useable. Just kidding, there's no logic to my reason. But I thought it just sounded good. Actaully, Sargon, that's not far from how New Finland made Kuu into a habitable moon in Roger MacBride Allen's seminal novel The Torch Of Honor...they injected an asteroid with material which blew it up into a round sphere. The same process could be used, maybe, to give Mars a molten core(tho with it's thick regolith, it's going to take a lot, even if the process were possible). Either that, or use nanotechnology to re-shape Martian geology to create both a molten core and a more dense planet(more gravity). As for generating an atmosphere, it might just be easier to seed Mars with genmodded algae which would thrive in Mars' thin carbon-dioxide atmospher and excrete oxygen. Or, maybe, depending on how much water is left on Mars, induce cryovolcanic events to release water vapor into the atmosphere. "You're everything that's base in humanity," Cochrane continued. "Drawing up strict, senseless rules for the sole reason of putting you at the top and excluding anyone you say doesn't belong or fit in, for no other reason than just because you say so." —Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stephens, Federation |
 March 3, 2010 - 7:00pm | It would be to risky, you hit it wrong and shatter it and you'll screw up the whole inner planets. Bova and other suggest that it has enough gravity to hold a thin atmosphere which would be found on earth at high atmospheres. It just needs a ozone layer to stop most of the radiation. but it would be at the mercy of very strong solar flares and winds. you'll find most life in the deep cnyons and low spots where atmoshpere pools. or you get lucky and find a on switch ala total recall hehe You could turn jupiter into an other sun with slamming tons of asteriods and comets into it. 2001 series theroy. It was almost a mini sun if it had more mass. Gold is for the mistress-silver for the maid-copper for the craftsman cunning at his trade.But Iron-Cold Iron- is master of them all |
March 3, 2010 - 8:01pm | it has enough gravity to hold a thin atmosphere which would be found on earth at high atmospheres. It's current atmosphere is 200x thinner than earth's (equivilent to being at ~40,000 ft).You could turn jupiter into an other sun with slamming tons of asteriods and comets into it. 2001 series theroy. It was almost a mini sun if it had more mass. Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
 March 4, 2010 - 6:19am | Juptier only has about 1% of the mass needed to be a star. It would need to be 80x more massive to sustain nuclear fusion. How about compressing it and making a sun the size of Terra or Luna? Time flies when your having rum. Im a government employee, I dont goof-off. I constructively abuse my time. |
March 4, 2010 - 9:15am | Juptier only has about 1% of the mass needed to be a star. It would need to be 80x more massive to sustain nuclear fusion. How about compressing it and making a sun the size of Terra or Luna? You could do that to ignite it, but unless you maintained whatever force you applied to compress it, it would just blow itself apart. The ~80 Jupiter mass limit (it varies a bit depending on the amount of metals - anything other than hydrogen or helium - in the object) is what is needed for two things. First to provide the compression (pressure and tempurature) needed at the core of the object to ignite fusion and second to provide the gravitational force necessary to hold the thing together once the energy from fusion gets released. Naturally, based on the laws of physics, something like Jupiter doesn't get any bigger or smaller as you add or subtract mass. Saturn is only 1/4 the mass of Jupiter, but basically the same size. Brown dwarfs, the object ranging from about 1/4 Juptier masses up the the minimum stellar mass are all the same size as Jupiter regardless of their mass. As more mass is added they just get denser and denser. Once an object is massive enough for fusion it gets a bit bigger as there is more energy to push outward against gravity but even the lowest mass stars aren't much bigger than Jupiter (maybe 2x the diameter). Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
March 4, 2010 - 11:29am | Naturally, based on the laws of physics, something like Jupiter doesn't get any bigger or smaller as you add or subtract mass. Saturn is only 1/4 the mass of Jupiter, but basically the same size. Brown dwarfs, the object ranging from about 1/4 Juptier masses up the the minimum stellar mass are all the same size as Jupiter regardless of their mass. As more mass is added they just get denser and denser. Once an object is massive enough for fusion it gets a bit bigger as there is more energy to push outward against gravity but even the lowest mass stars aren't much bigger than Jupiter (maybe 2x the diameter). Thats what I was wondering when i sent my last comment. My thought was that if you compress it, it would become denser, then that would increase the gravity which would hold it all together. Time flies when your having rum. Im a government employee, I dont goof-off. I constructively abuse my time. |
March 4, 2010 - 2:56pm | It does not change it size when you add mass, what it could do is compress the core as you add mass it will be drawn in to the core, raising the heat and pressure. But after doing some reading it would take around 75% more of it's mass to even start it. Thats a lot of mass and money, cheaper to seed venus with algae along with mars. Gold is for the mistress-silver for the maid-copper for the craftsman cunning at his trade.But Iron-Cold Iron- is master of them all |
 March 6, 2010 - 2:13pm | Iggy: the leading theory currently does hold that Mars lost (and cannot retain) its atmosphere due to the lack of a strong magnetic field. This allows the solar wind to strip away any gases it could otherwise hold. jedion357: the Mars trilogy was by Kim Stanley Robinson. Entertaining books, but he doesn't really do anything about the magnetic field problem for Mars terraforming. There was an idea back in the mid-70's to reignite Mars's core by dumping H-bombs into Mons Olympia, but this likely wouldn't have done anything. Long live the Frontier! |
 March 6, 2010 - 3:08pm | No, but spending billions of dollars to set off really big explosions sounds like fun. Reminds me of when I was a kid saving all my money to buy M80s. |
March 12, 2010 - 6:44pm | Inigo: lol! I remember those days! Most of the theories out now just talk about seeding a world with simple lifeforms to generate the right atmo, and hope for the best... Long live the Frontier! |
 March 13, 2010 - 1:30pm | I was doing research on planets recently and yes, Mars doesn't sustain a significant atmosphere because of having virtually no magnetosphere. The moon is the same way, but it has virtually no magnetosphere because it doesn't spin. Even still, the moon does have a very mild atmosphere extending about a foot off the surface, if I remember correctly. The magnetosphere seems to be the most significant problem to maintaining an atmosphere. View my profile for a list of articles I have written, am writing, will write. "It's yo' mama!" —Wicket W. Warrick, Star Wars Ep. VI: Return of the Jedi "That guy's wise." —Logray, Star Wars Ep.VI: Return of the Jedi Do You Wanna Date My Avatar? - Felicia Day (The Guild) |
March 13, 2010 - 11:40pm | Other planets may be able to be terraformed by transforming their upper atmospheres. Venus, for instance, may be able to be terraformed, but its atmosphere is so dense up to 50 kilometers above its surface, that the only way to terraform it is to terroform the upper atmosphere and build cities that float on the extremely dense lower atmosphere, like the floating castles of fantasy stories. Bespin anyone? This makes a good "location" even though everyone will say you just ripped off Empire Strikes Back- but if its the only way to colonize a planet like venus and that planet had some unique or valuable assets then... EDIT: along with using this as an exotic setting for the game I'd be inclined to use it with a new race- Boon-sha or other built these cities to colonize the planet. for conflict the obvious comes to mind: morlocks go below to do the dangerous mining and their is unrest connected with that is one idea 2. this is a colony and for some reason they dont want the new guys to learn about where their home world is. 3. they have some rudimentary anti grav and don't want the secret getting out. 4. "The recently made a deal that will keep the Sathar out of here for ever" (has anyone else thought that the title "Lord of the Sith" sounds like a sathar titles? I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
March 14, 2010 - 7:15pm | Noted for the planetary system generation document. :-) 5. The gas that is mined and only available on this world is the fuel used to float the cities. 6. Wars have been fought for the rights to the gas so it can be transported to other gaseous worlds. "Worm Lord of the Sathe - a Dark Jedion chronicle" |
March 15, 2010 - 4:34pm | Another problem to terraforming I discovered in planet research is that of meteors and meteor showers. The magnetosphere is a significant part of the reason earth doesn't suffer a major catastrophe every 5 to 10 years. The magnetosphere protects us from much of the space debris. So even if you terraform a planet with little or no magnetosphere (which would require terraforming plants running for eternity), you would still have the problem of space depris causing regular and horrific catastrophes to the terraformed atmosphere and the planet's population. View my profile for a list of articles I have written, am writing, will write. "It's yo' mama!" —Wicket W. Warrick, Star Wars Ep. VI: Return of the Jedi "That guy's wise." —Logray, Star Wars Ep.VI: Return of the Jedi Do You Wanna Date My Avatar? - Felicia Day (The Guild) |
March 15, 2010 - 9:08pm | Another problem to terraforming I discovered in planet research is
that of meteors and meteor showers. The magnetosphere is a significant
part of the reason earth doesn't suffer a major catastrophe every 5 to
10 years. The magnetosphere protects us from much of the space debris.
So even if you terraform a planet with little or no magnetosphere
(which would require terraforming plants running for eternity), you
would still have the problem of space depris causing regular and
horrific catastrophes to the terraformed atmosphere and the planet's
population. Could you provide sources? I'd be interested in reading them. I have to say though that this has all my warning bells and flags going off as completely incorrect. I could be wrong but that doesn't jive with anything I know about physics and astronomy. I think you've picked up some bad information somewhere. By definition, a magnetic field only exerts a force on a charged particle. Bulk material like meteors large enough to cause any amount of damage are electrically neutral. They might have a small amount of net (static) charge but compared to their mass, it is neglible. The earth's magnetic field just has no effect on large objects. For small stuff like the stuff that makes shooting stars (dust finer than cigarette smoke) it can have an effect and does have an effect on charged particles from the sun and outside the solar system. It does protect us (somewhat) from that type of radiation. All told about 100,000 tons of material falls to the earth from space each year but it is mostly all "dust". The real reason we are not constantly plagued by big things hitting us is, to paraphrase Clyde Tombaugh, because space is very, very large and we're very, very small. The chance of random collision is just very tiny. Remember if you took all the material in the asteroid belt, it would only come to ~4% the mass of the moon. And the Kuiper belt (comets) all told only come to about 10% the mass of the Earth. There just isn't that much stuff out there to collide with us. And most of that is in stable orbits that don't come anywhere near the earth or any other planet. So by the time you were terraforming a planet, there wouldn't be much chance of collision. On another topic that was mentioned, it turns out Earth's atmosphere would be almost identical to Venus's except for one thing: water. We have as much carbon as Venus has in its atmophere here on the Earth. The only difference is that on Earth, there was water, which the carbon dioxide dissolved into and then percolated out as carbonateous rocks. This caused a thinning of the Earth's atmoshpere. Venus doesn't have any water to speak of really and so all the carbon dioxide stayed in the atmophere giving it the thick atmophere it has today. Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
March 15, 2010 - 9:36pm | On another topic that was mentioned, it turns out Earth's atmosphere would be almost identical to Venus's except for one thing: water. We have as much carbon as Venus has in its atmophere here on the Earth. The only difference is that on Earth, there was water, which the carbon dioxide dissolved into and then percolated out as carbonateous rocks. This caused a thinning of the Earth's atmoshpere. Venus doesn't have any water to speak of really and so all the carbon dioxide stayed in the atmophere giving it the thick atmophere it has today. Does this mean that if we sent out tugs to grab cometary material and dumped it into Venus's gravity well that we could kick start tera forming? I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
March 16, 2010 - 9:19am | Does this mean that if we sent out tugs to grab cometary material and dumped it into Venus's gravity well that we could kick start tera forming? Possibly. I don't remember the exact details of the process (It's been a long time since grad school ). But you'd need a lot of coments. Assuming a typical comet is 10 miles in diameter, to get the equivilent amount of water in the earth's oceans, you'd need to grab on the order of 700,000 to 1 million comets. That's a lot of trips and represents about 0.3% of the mass of the Kuiper belt. Now there are a lot of objects out there bigger than that but they're even harder to move.Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
March 16, 2010 - 11:51am | Does this mean that if we sent out tugs to grab cometary material and dumped it into Venus's gravity well that we could kick start tera forming? Possibly. I don't remember the exact details of the process (It's been a long time since grad school ). But you'd need a lot of coments. Assuming a typical comet is 10 miles in diameter, to get the equivilent amount of water in the earth's oceans, you'd need to grab on the order of 700,000 to 1 million comets. That's a lot of trips and represents about 0.3% of the mass of the Kuiper belt. Now there are a lot of objects out there bigger than that but they're even harder to move.So its not likely to be feasible for the near future- at least till grav/anti grav tech is possible. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
March 18, 2010 - 3:29pm | Another problem to terraforming I discovered in planet research is that of meteors and meteor showers. The magnetosphere is a significant part of the reason earth doesn't suffer a major catastrophe every 5 to 10 years. The magnetosphere protects us from much of the space debris. So even if you terraform a planet with little or no magnetosphere (which would require terraforming plants running for eternity), you would still have the problem of space depris causing regular and horrific catastrophes to the terraformed atmosphere and the planet's population. Could you provide sources? I'd be interested in reading them. I have to say though that this has all my warning bells and flags going off as completely incorrect. I could be wrong but that doesn't jive with anything I know about physics and astronomy. I think you've picked up some bad information somewhere. But I suppose in a round-about way, it could be laid to the magnetosphere, as the atmosphere can't maintain itself without a magnetosphere, but yes, that's reaching. View my profile for a list of articles I have written, am writing, will write. "It's yo' mama!" —Wicket W. Warrick, Star Wars Ep. VI: Return of the Jedi "That guy's wise." —Logray, Star Wars Ep.VI: Return of the Jedi Do You Wanna Date My Avatar? - Felicia Day (The Guild) |
