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  • Hey there and welcome to Life Noggin!

  • As we blow through the resources on Earth, it's clear we're going to need a new planet soon.

  • And since there isn't another Earth out there, is it possible we could make one through terraforming?

  • Terraforming is the process of turning a hostile environment into one that can support human life.

  • And a possible place where this could happen is Mars.

  • After all, it's literally right there, and might be a good replacement for Earth.

  • So what do we have to work with?

  • Well, Mars' atmosphere is really thin, only about one percent of what we have on Earth.

  • And it's carbon dioxide, so toxic to humans.

  • Mars is also further from the Sun and that coupled with its thin atmosphere means it's about -63 degrees Celsius.

  • So, sorry folks, your winter coats won't quite cut it.

  • On top of that, Mars also has no magnetosphere so no protection against radiation.

  • And it also only has about one-third of the gravity we feel on Earth.

  • So, clearly, there's a lot we'd need to change.

  • Let's start with the atmosphere.

  • We'd have to make it thicker and change its composition.

  • One way to do this would be to trigger a greenhouse effect, making it so any heat from the Sun is trapped, heating the planet all over.

  • We could do this a bunch of different ways, like using methane mined from the rocks on Mars,

  • carbon dioxide -- if we could get enough of it, or even with ammonia!

  • Let's focus on that last one for a minute.

  • We could release that ammonia by smashing ice-rich comets from the outer Solar System.

  • And since ammonia is mostly nitrogen by weight, once we add oxygen through plant life,

  • we could have an atmosphere pretty similar to Earth's!

  • And with a thicker atmosphere, the atmospheric pressure would be high enough for human to possibly live.

  • From here, the atmosphere will warm the planet and the rest of the terraforming job will be a relative cakewalk.

  • We can melt Mars' polar ice caps and have water, and with water we can have the environment for life,

  • make some changes to the Martian soil, and set up shop on the formerly red planet.

  • But wait, there's more!

  • Remember the wholeMars has no magnetospherething?

  • Turns out, that's a big part of why Mars lost its atmosphere in the first place.

  • Mars' global magnetic field shut down around 4.2 billion years ago,

  • and from there the solar wind and powerful sun explosions stripped away most the atmosphere, sending it off into space.

  • And that's not good, since that means there isn't a trove of carbon dioxide in the Mars rocks to release in order to trigger a greenhouse effect.

  • And also, any atmosphere we do add to Mars won't last.

  • Eventually, it'll be stripped away by radiation and solar wind, too.

  • And whatever wasn't would be hard to hold onto with Mars' weaker gravity.

  • So, Mars isn't the best option.

  • Instead, let's check our other nearest neighbor: Venus.

  • Venus has a super-thick atmosphere and temperatures around 460 degrees Celsius so we'd have to change a lot of that, too.

  • One option is to bombard Venus with hydrogen from gas giants, creating graphite and water that would turn into global oceans.

  • These would dissolve produced nitrogen and lower the atmospheric pressure to something more Earth-like.

  • We could also terraform parts of Mercury.

  • There's water and organic molecules in the northern polar region, so heating the bottoms of big craters with mirrors could melt the ice.

  • And adding a dome on top could create a little life-bubble on a hostile planet.

  • The same thing could be done on the Moon, too.

  • Hopefully that life-bubble has Wi-Fi.

  • We could maybe terraform Europawell, sort of.

  • If we could melt the surface ice, some of the released oxygen could populate the atmosphere

  • and we could have a water world on our hands.

  • and it's even possible to terraform Titan, too, but we'd also have to create oxygen and make the moon less toxic to humans.

  • But all this is really hard and really far off in the future.

  • While I'd love to call another place in this universe my home, we should probably just protect the Earth we have now.

  • What do you think?

  • Should we be terraforming other planets?

  • This video was written by space historian Amy Shira Teitel.

  • She makes a new video every week over on her channel, and you HAVE to check them out!

  • There's a link in the description if youre on mobile.

  • Make sure you come back every Monday for a brand new video.

  • As always, I'm Blocko and this has been Life Noggin.

  • Don't forget to keep on thinking!

Hey there and welcome to Life Noggin!

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