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NASA Planetary Science: Magnetic shield at Mars' L1 point might restore atmosphere

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Rentahamster

Rodent Whores
That isn't how magnetic fields work NASA. Those parallel lines going off to infinity SMDH.

Div B = 0

Watch the video with the actual simulation shots.

B4YFkffl.png
 

Raticus79

Seek victory, not fairness
I guess the real question is how big would the magnet have to be. Is it even feasible to build a magnet of that size, even if we assumed the necessary advances in space tech to get it into space and to tow it to the Lagrange point?

It wouldn't need to be one huge block - you could deliver chunks until enough has accumulated to do the job.
 

Faddy

Banned
Watch the video with the actual simulation shots.

B4YFkffl.png

That isn't a representation of magnetic field.

See the white lines in the first image, those are a representation of the magnetic field generated by the shield, there is no way those lines should be going off to infinity. It is bad science and goes against the fundamental principles of electromagnetism.

The colours on your image I assume is particle density of the solar wind.
 

thespot84

Member
Wouldnt earth produce a trail like that? If it's long enough we should just move Mars into our wake. Problem solved.
since we're talking about shit we can't really do anyways
 

PolishQ

Member
The other nitpick with the OP is that if something is placed at Mars' L1 point, it's not "orbiting Mars". It remains precisely balanced between Mars and the Sun at all times, so in a sense it's orbiting the Sun. But an object can also orbit a Lagrange point, which is called a halo orbit.
 

danthefan

Member
That isn't a representation of magnetic field.

See the white lines in the first image, those are a representation of the magnetic field generated by the shield, there is no way those lines should be going off to infinity. It is bad science and goes against the fundamental principles of electromagnetism.

The colours on your image I assume is particle density of the solar wind.

I'm sure it's meant to be the magnetotail.

Out in space, the solar wind presses against this bubble and stretches it, creating a long “magnetotail” in the downwind direction.

https://www.nasa.gov/topics/moonmars/features/magnetotail_080416.html
 
That isn't a representation of magnetic field.

See the white lines in the first image, those are a representation of the magnetic field generated by the shield, there is no way those lines should be going off to infinity. It is bad science and goes against the fundamental principles of electromagnetism.

The colours on your image I assume is particle density of the solar wind.

What you're missing is that the field lines are not just those of the dipole, but the net field in a medium filled with plasma, in which currents flow. The dynamics is complicated and the field lines can be dragged away by the plasma. The Magnetotail is a real feature of the Magnetosphere. I should also point that a uniform field is just as divergenceless as a circulating one, that is, field lines can indeed "end at infinity", in a idealized situation where the sources are too far away (think of the field of an infinite solenoid).

Found a nice picture showing the currents:
Solar_flares_magnestosphere.jpg
 

Faddy

Banned
What you're missing is that the field lines are not just those of the dipole, but the net field in a medium filled with plasma, in which currents flow. The dynamics is complicated and the field lines can be dragged away by the plasma. The Magnetotail is a real feature of the Magnetosphere. I should also point that a uniform field is just as divergenceless as a circulating one, that is, field lines can indeed "end at infinity", in a idealized situation where the sources are too far away.

If they were going for the net magnetosphere the front lobes of the magnetic field shouldn't be the same as the trailing lobes then suddenly go off to infinity. They should have elongated all the field lines facing away from the solar wind like this

WAWNLjN.gif
 

danthefan

Member
If they were going for the net magnetosphere the front lobes of the magnetic field shouldn't be the same as the trailing lobes then suddenly go off to infinity. They should have elongated all the field lines facing away from the solar wind like this

WAWNLjN.gif


What a bizarre thing to get worked up about.

Edit - and since the Earth's magnetotail extends at least to the moon and beyond, the picture you've posted quite obviously isn't to scale.
 
If they were going for the net magnetosphere the front lobes of the magnetic field shouldn't be the same as the trailing lobes then suddenly go off to infinity. They should have elongated all the field lines facing away from the solar wind like this

WAWNLjN.gif

That image doesn't accurately portray the analog nature of magnetic fields.

SMDH
 

HTupolev

Member
See the white lines in the first image, those are a representation of the magnetic field generated by the shield, there is no way those lines should be going off to infinity.
It's a quick artist mock-up which was designed to look slick and be easy to label, and which within the scope of the image is basically topologically correct. It's not a precise field line map of the model.
 
If they were going for the net magnetosphere the front lobes of the magnetic field shouldn't be the same as the trailing lobes then suddenly go off to infinity. They should have elongated all the field lines facing away from the solar wind like this

WAWNLjN.gif
Oh yeah, I agree they could have made the transition more gradual, no dispute here.
 

akira28

Member
do it in phases. Asteroid base. Mars Moon base. Bases on Mars.

Construction network to make the thing in space, probably near orbit for logical convenience. Coordinate between natural resources on Ceres, and Mars base to make this thing big as all heck, and to position it at whatever Lagrange point they figure to be the best.

And no, please no crashing asteroids into the surface please. We can set up some domes and let this thing happen over the course of centuries. Our best bet is for underground construction, which we currently have the technology to do, funnily enough.

We have the technology to do 70% of this stuff. We just lack the money and the political will. Give NASA 50 billion dollars tomorrow and we'd be 50% of the way to mars in 20 years. I mean permanent presence.

Its not impossible, its frustratingly possible, and it has been for a long time. But we've had this Cold war thing going on since forever, and its after effects like the war on terror, and now other crap trying to kick off, have been focusing the attention of humanity on other things, like fear of death, while billions of dollars keep disappearing into the pockets of all these rich oligarchs for some reason.
 

LordKasual

Banned
marsearth.jpg


mars is kinda small compared to earth. 'bout half.

Yeah. Mars' surface gravity is a much bigger issue than anything else about it. Humans do not do good in low gravity situations.

And even assuming we were 500 years in the future, there still wouldn't be a damn thing we could do about it.

If one thing has stayed constant about Earth in all the years life has evolved, it's been the gravity. We can manage atmosphere, temperature and radiation shielding. That constant force though is another story.
 

akira28

Member
Just one more way for a future super villain to destroy the planet

Nah. I mean, it wouldn't destroy anything immediately. It would fuck with the communications like crazy, and maybe the technet....I'm not sure. The people would have plenty of time to reposition it if it got moved, or repair it if it got damaged.

Just..make sure to have a spare. In case some asshole blew the whole thing up.
even in worst case, they would need another six months to a year to make another one, and everyone would be confined to the habitat domes and underground cities. Not a big deal.
 

Crispy75

Member
Yeah. Mars' surface gravity is a much bigger issue than anything else about it. Humans do not do good in low gravity situations.
Well we don't really know. We know that 1g is good for you, and 0g is bad for you, but there have been no studies (not even on animals) of the effects of prolonged living in 0.38g.
 
Well we don't really know. We know that 1g is good for you, and 0g is bad for you, but there have been no studies (not even on animals) of the effects of prolonged living in 0.38g.

I think the main concern is returning back to earth --- you can't. But also since our bodies are only built for 1g, nothing good will come out of .38g. Bone density, muscles, organs, blood pressure, red blood cell counts and etc, everything takes a hit.
 

FyreWulff

Member
Yeah. Mars' surface gravity is a much bigger issue than anything else about it. Humans do not do good in low gravity situations.

And even assuming we were 500 years in the future, there still wouldn't be a damn thing we could do about it.

If one thing has stayed constant about Earth in all the years life has evolved, it's been the gravity. We can manage atmosphere, temperature and radiation shielding. That constant force though is another story.

We could probably adapt. The issue is that Mars humans could never come to Earth. So we'd essentially be forking humanity.
 

BiGBoSSMk23

A company being excited for their new game is a huge slap in the face to all the fans that liked their old games.
Yeah. Mars' surface gravity is a much bigger issue than anything else about it. Humans do not do good in low gravity situations.

And even assuming we were 500 years in the future, there still wouldn't be a damn thing we could do about it.

If one thing has stayed constant about Earth in all the years life has evolved, it's been the gravity. We can manage atmosphere, temperature and radiation shielding. That constant force though is another story.

Yeah, our organs wouldn't function properly right?

I wonder what the full extent of ramifications long term low gravity has on the organism.

Circulatory, digestive, musculoskeletal, and cognitive.

It's crazy how tailor made we are for Earth.

I wager interplanetary colonists will be a new subspecies by the end of it.
 

FyreWulff

Member
Yeah, our organs wouldn't function properly right?

I wonder what the full extent of ramifications long term low gravity has on the organism.

Circulatory, digestive, musculoskeletal, and cognitive.

It's crazy how tailor made we are for Earth.

I wager interplanetary colonists will be a new subspecies by the end of it.

pretty much any settling of planets will create split offs. Either because of planet conditions or the length of time required to travel to distant stars.

Hell, it takes what, 18 minutes for light and therefore signals to travel from Mars to Earth? The comms delay alone would cause a split even culturally assuming all else was the same.
 

BiGBoSSMk23

A company being excited for their new game is a huge slap in the face to all the fans that liked their old games.
We could probably adapt. The issue is that Mars humans could never come to Earth. So we'd essentially be forking humanity.

pretty much any settling of planets will create split offs. Either because of planet conditions or the length of time required to travel to distant stars.

Hell, it takes what, 18 minutes for light and therefore signals to travel from Mars to Earth? The comms delay alone would cause a split even culturally assuming all else was the same.

Hold up. There were humanoids on Mars prior to the atmospheric breakdown?

Like, is that a solid theory now?

Wonder how squishy they'd be compared to us.
 

xenist

Member
Venus should be easier and faster to transform. Just make something that gets rid of the thick atmosohere

Sure. Much easier. Venus is what religions describe Hell as. Out of the rocky planets and moons in our system it's pretty much the worst.
 

akira28

Member
Hold up. There were humanoids on Mars prior to the atmospheric breakdown?

Like, is that a solid theory now?

Wonder how squishy they'd be compared to us.

no, I think...how did you get that from those two statements?

vv: dude venus is kind of close to the sun.
 

N.Domixis

Banned
Sure. Much easier. Venus is what religions describe Hell as. Out of the rocky planets and moons in our system it's pretty much the worst.
Fucking Venus just had to gas it's self, it definitely would have been livable if it didn't happen.
 

FyreWulff

Member
Hold up. There were humanoids on Mars prior to the atmospheric breakdown?

Like, is that a solid theory now?

Wonder how squishy they'd be compared to us.

No.

But we generally know that growing up in lower gravity would lead to less bone density alone. Which means if you came to Earth, you'd crush yourself.

The only way to get around it would be to simulate Earth's 1G on Mars surface habitats.
 
Hold up. There were humanoids on Mars prior to the atmospheric breakdown?

Like, is that a solid theory now?

Wonder how squishy they'd be compared to us.

No, if / when we start settling other worlds humanity would evolve differently in its different planets. Eventually humans from Earth and Humans from other planets would be substantially different
 

Rentahamster

Rodent Whores
Restore the atmosphere? I doubt it.

Protect the remaining atmosphere? Sure.

The hypothesis is that right now the atmosphere regeneration is in equilibrium with the atmospheric stripping. If the severity of the stripping could be reduced by the magnetic shield, then that would mean the atmosphere gains more than it loses over time.
 
Small but the same amount of land.
Venus should be easier and faster to transform. Just make something that gets rid of the thick atmosohere

unfortunately, Venus has both no dynamo (so no magnetic shield caused by magma going round the core) and has more heat left than Mars does, causing it to undergo a process called a 'global resurfacing event'.
What that means is that once in a while, the planet basically just cracks open, dumps a hot load of magma on the surface, and uses that to cool off the buildup of heat within the planet's deeper layers.

So you could never terraform the surface without running into a global disaster when that even takes place, and the amount of heat and pollution would be far in excess of what the terraforming technology would be able to handle afterwards, since it would literally return the whole planet back to where you started. That said, these things happen on a million year time-frame, so you'd probably only have to deal with it once in human terms.
 

Rentahamster

Rodent Whores
Small but the same amount of land.
Venus should be easier and faster to transform. Just make something that gets rid of the thick atmosohere

unfortunately, Venus has both no dynamo (so no magnetic shield caused by magma going round the core) and has more heat left than Mars does, causing it to undergo a process called a 'global resurfacing event'.
What that means is that once in a while, the planet basically just cracks open, dumps a hot load of magma on the surface, and uses that to cool off the buildup of heat within the planet's deeper layers.

So you could never terraform the surface without running into a global disaster when that even takes place, and the amount of heat and pollution would be far in excess of what the terraforming technology would be able to handle afterwards, since it would literally return the whole planet back to where you started. That said, these things happen on a million year time-frame, so you'd probably only have to deal with it once in human terms.

It might be easier to just colonize Venus' upper atmosphere.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJ5KV3rzuag
 

Khaz

Member
I doubt that the gravity would be a real problem. The lack of it is a problem for our organs, especially the vascular system, as they can't function properly after a while without a sense of up and down. But a reduced yet present gravity should pose much less of a threat. I'd expect most problems be caused by people jumping around and hitting walls or something :D
 

Jedi2016

Member
The concept is sound in principle, but I wonder what kind of magnetic source would be needed to shield an entire planet. And can we even produce something like that?
 
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