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mars
Mars - Mission for Future
Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun – a dusty, cold, desert world with a very thin atmosphere. Mars is also a dynamic planet with seasons, polar ice caps, canyons, extinct volcanoes, and evidence that it was even more active in the past.
Mars is one of the most explored bodies in our solar system, and it's the only planet where we've sent rovers to roam the alien landscape.
NASA currently has two rovers (Curiosity and Perseverance), one lander (InSight), and one helicopter (Ingenuity) exploring the surface of Mars.
Perseverance rover – the largest, most advanced rover NASA has sent to another world – touched down on Mars on Feb. 18, 2021, after a 203-day journey traversing 293 million miles (472 million kilometers). The Ingenuity helicopter rode to Mars attached to the belly of Perseverance.
Perseverance is one of three spacecraft that arrived at Mars in 2021. The Hope orbiter from the United Arab Emirates arrived on Feb. 9, 2021. China’s Tianwen-1 mission arrived on Feb. 10, 2021, and includes an orbiter, a lander, and a rover. Europe and India also have spacecraft studying Mars from orbit.
In May 2021, China became the second nation to ever land successfully on Mars when its Zhurong Mars rover touched down.
An international fleet of eight orbiters is studying the Red Planet from above including three NASA orbiters: 2001 Mars Odyssey, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, and MAVEN.
These robotic explorers have found lots of evidence that Mars was much wetter and warmer, with a thicker atmosphere, billions of years ago.
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Core and Structure
Deimos and Phobos
Sattelite of mars
Curiosity
Mars Exploration Rovers
Namesake
Mars was named by the ancient Romans for their god of war because its reddish color was reminiscent of blood. Other civilizations also named the planet for this attribute – for example, the Egyptians called it "Her Desher," meaning "the red one." Even today, it is frequently called the "Red Planet" because iron minerals in the Martian dirt oxidize, or rust, causing the surface to look red.
Potential for Life
Scientists don't expect to find living things currently thriving on Mars. Instead, they're looking for signs of life that existed long ago, when Mars was warmer and covered with water.
Size and Distance
With a radius of 2,106 miles (3,390 kilometers), Mars is about half the size of Earth. If Earth were the size of a nickel, Mars would be about as big as a raspberry.
From an average distance of 142 million miles (228 million kilometers), Mars is 1.5 astronomical units away from the Sun. One astronomical unit (abbreviated as AU), is the distance from the Sun to Earth. From this distance, it takes sunlight 13 minutes to travel from the Sun to Mars.
Orbit and Rotation
As Mars orbits the Sun, it completes one rotation every 24.6 hours, which is very similar to one day on Earth (23.9 hours). Martian days are called sols – short for "solar day." A year on Mars lasts 669.6 sols, which is the same as 687 Earth days.
Mars' axis of rotation is tilted 25 degrees with respect to the plane of its orbit around the Sun. This is another similarity with Earth, which has an axial tilt of 23.4 degrees. Like Earth, Mars has distinct seasons, but they last longer than seasons here on Earth since Mars takes longer to orbit the Sun (because it's farther away). And while here on Earth the seasons are evenly spread over the year, lasting 3 months (or one quarter of a year), on Mars the seasons vary in length because of Mars' elliptical, egg-shaped orbit around the Sun.
Spring in the northern hemisphere (autumn in the southern) is the longest season at 194 sols. Autumn in the northern hemisphere (spring in the southern) is the shortest at 142 days. Northern winter/southern summer is 154 sols, and northern summer/southern winter is 178 sols.
Moons
Mars has two small moons, Phobos and Deimos, that may be captured asteroids. They're potato-shaped because they have too little mass for gravity to make them spherical.
The moons get their names from the horses that pulled the chariot of the Greek god of war, Ares.
Phobos, the innermost and larger moon, is heavily cratered, with deep grooves on its surface. It is slowly moving towards Mars and will crash into the planet or break apart in about 50 million years.
Deimos is about half as big as Phobos and orbits two and a half times farther away from Mars. Oddly-shaped Deimos is covered in loose dirt that often fills the craters on its surface, making it appear smoother than pockmarked Phobos.
Atmosphere
Mars has a thin atmosphere made up mostly of carbon dioxide, nitrogen, and argon gases. To our eyes, the sky would be hazy and red because of suspended dust instead of the familiar blue tint we see on Earth. Mars' sparse atmosphere doesn't offer much protection from impacts by such objects as meteorites, asteroids, and comets.
The temperature on Mars can be as high as 70 degrees Fahrenheit (20 degrees Celsius) or as low as about -225 degrees Fahrenheit (-153 degrees Celsius). And because the atmosphere is so thin, heat from the Sun easily escapes this planet. If you were to stand on the surface of Mars on the equator at noon, it would feel like spring at your feet (75 degrees Fahrenheit or 24 degrees Celsius) and winter at your head (32 degrees Fahrenheit or 0 degrees Celsius).
Occasionally, winds on Mars are strong enough to create dust storms that cover much of the planet. After such storms, it can be months before all of the dust settles.
Magnetosphere
Mars has no global magnetic field today, but areas of the Martian crust in the southern hemisphere are highly magnetized, indicating traces of a magnetic field from 4 billion years ago.
10 Need-to-Know Things About Mars
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SMALL PLANET
If the Sun were as tall as a typical front door, Earth would be the size of a dime, and Mars would be about as big as an aspirin tablet.
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RUGGED TERRAIN
Mars is a rocky planet. Its solid surface has been altered by volcanoes, impacts, winds, crustal movement and chemical reactions.
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RINGLESS
There are no rings around Mars.
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FOURTH ROCK
Mars orbits our Sun, a star. Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun at an average distance of about 228 million km (142 million miles) or 1.52 AU.
BRING A SPACESUIT
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Mars has a thin atmosphere made up mostly of carbon dioxide (CO2), argon (Ar), nitrogen (N2), and a small amount of oxygen and water vapor.
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MANY MISSIONS
Several missions have visited this planet, from flybys and orbiters to rovers on the surface.The first true Mars mission success was the Mariner 4 flyby in 1965.
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RUSTY PLANET
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LONGER DAYS
One day on Mars takes a little over 24 hours. Mars makes a complete orbit around the Sun (a year in Martian time) in 687 Earth days.
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TWO MOONS
Mars has two moons named Phobos and Deimos.
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TOUGH PLACE FOR LIFE
At this time, Mars' surface cannot support life as we know it. Current missions are determining Mars' past and future potential for life.
Mars is known as the Red Planet because iron minerals in the Martian soil oxidize, or rust, causing the soil and atmosphere to look red.
Pop Culture
No other planet has captured our collective imagination quite like Mars.
In the late 1800s when people first observed the canal-like features on Mars' surface, many speculated that an intelligent alien species resided there. This led to numerous stories about Martians, some of whom invade Earth, like in the 1938 radio drama, "The War of the Worlds." According to an enduring urban legend, many listeners believed the story to be real news coverage of an invasion, causing widespread panic.
Countless stories since have taken place on Mars or explored the possibilities of its Martian inhabitants. Movies like "Total Recall" (1990 and 2012) take us to a terraformed Mars and a struggling colony running out of air. A Martian colony and Earth have a prickly relationship in "The Expanse" television series and novels.
And in the 2014 novel and its 2015 movie adaptation, "The Martian," botanist Mark Watney is stranded alone on the planet and struggles to survive until a rescue mission can retrieve him.