Restart the magnetic field of Mars? Researchers have the solution

The terraforming. It is often discussed in science fiction. But for science quite simply, imagining implementing the idea – transforming an environment to make it habitable by humans – is still difficult today. Yet scientists believe that if we want to colonize Mars, for example, it will have to be seriously considered. A first step, according to an international team including the chief scientist of the Nasa, James Green, would be to reform around the Red Planet a magnetic shield lost, or almost, for a long time.

the magnetic field surrounding the Earth indeed protects us from most high-charged particles energy that come to us from Sun. It deflects them and thus prevents them from reaching the surface. It also protects us more broadly from the effects of solar wind on theatmosphere. Because the latter has the unfortunate tendency to literally strip unprotected atmospheres. This is what seems to have happened to Mars. Its once thick atmosphere has gradually diminished.

the magnetic field of our Earth is created by dynamo effect. By movements of iron core at the heart of our planet. But the core of Mars is too small and not hot enough for that. So the researchers thought of other ideas. If it is not possible to create a flow of charged particles in the depths of the Red Planet, why not consider creating one … around Mars?

A magnetic field thanks to Phobos

For this, the researchers are counting on Phobos. Phobos is the larger of the two moons of Mars. All modesty kept. Because the astronomers set its largest diameter at less than 30 kilometers. But it is also that of the two moons of Mars which orbit as close as possible to the Red Planet. On a relatively circular trajectory, only some 6,000 kilometers from Martian soil.

What the researchers suggest is that the particles that make up Phobos’ soil can be ionized and then accelerated. They could thus, along the orbit of the moon, create a kind of plasma torus. Which would itself give rise to a sufficiently powerful magnetic field – according to astronomers, there would be no need for much more than what can be generated by a magnet fairly classic, but to be repeated all around the planet – to protect human settlers who might want to settle on Mars in the long term.

Among the difficulties, the amount of energy required for the operation. The researchers estimate that it would take at least as much energy for this as what was consumed on Earth in 2020. And to solve this problem, they hope to be able to count on the nuclear fusion. A source of energy that could, in any case, prove to be essential for colonization.

The plan is therefore most daring. There are many obstacles. But for researchers, it is time to seriously ask the question. Because when we are ready to go to Mars, we will also have to be ready to offer innovative solutions.

Mars: NASA proposes to make it habitable by recreating its magnetic field

At a recent NASA conference, researchers came up with an ingenious idea to terraform Mars: create an artificial magnetic shield to suppress erosion of its atmosphere.

Article by Laurent Sacco published on 03/07/2017

Although located in the habitability zone of the Sun, Mars is different from Earth. The pressure of its atmosphere is indeed very weak (it represents 1/160^e of that of the Earth) and it contains 95.32% CO₂, only 2.7% ofnitrogen and 0.13% ofoxygen. The average temperature on its surface is also low: – 53 ° C. Water only seems to exist on the ground in the form of ice. However, everything indicates that in the distant past, about four billion years ago, the planet was much more welcoming, with oceans, a denser and warmer atmosphere thanks to a greenhouse effect.

It is by losing his magnetic field that Mars would have squandered its atmosphere (and much of its water). The cause ? The erosion caused by solar winds, according to the data provided by the Maven probe from NASA. These two conditions, the absence of a magnetic field maintained by an internal dynamo which has not worked for a long time and the absence of a thick atmosphere, have made our neighbor a cold and arid world whose surface is subjected to the deleterious bombardment of cosmic rays. This has not, however, discouraged humanity, which hopes to one day colonize the Red Planet. Some even hope for the terrarform by melting the masses of dry ice and water covering its poles.

A magnetic shield at the Lagrange L1 point of Mars

But this second Earth cannot last. Indeed, the weak gravity of Mars and, again, the erosion of its atmosphere would make it inhospitable again in just a few thousand years. It would even be definitive because it would have lost its last reserves of water and gas carbonic.

However, a group of researchers has just proposed a revolutionary solution to this problem during the NASA conference. Planetary Science Vision 2050 which took place in Washington. the concept seems straight out of sci-fi, or at the very least, if not as crazy as that of the Dyson sphere or theDeath Star of Star wars, he is of the caliber of space stations by Gerard O’Neill. It would not be less than placing at the Lagrange point L1 of the Mars-Sun system an object which would behave like a magnetic dipole, or in less technical terms, a magnet. Numerical simulations in support, they would have shown that a magnetosphere artificial could thus be deployed and would be able to protect from the erosion of the solar wind what remains of the atmosphere of Mars. This could take the form of a kind of inflatable balloon able to generate magnetic fields with an intensity of 1 to 2 teslas.

The fact remains that we do not have a precise evaluation of the device which would be capable of generating such a field and we can undoubtedly imagine that it would require a significant source of energy. Where would it come from? Of solar radiation with some photovoltaic cells ? It is also not known how it is planned to build it or what the cost of such an enterprise would be. In any case, this remains a fine intellectual exercise to be pursued and, who knows where humanity will be in a century from now with the technology of controlled fusion and exploitation robotic from asteroids ?