Bringing Life to Mars,

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Bringing Life to Mars,
and Mars to Life
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Terraforming defined

• Genesis of term
• Basic definition
• "...a process of planetary engineering,
  specifically directed at enhancing the capacity
  of an extraterrestrial planetary environment to
  support life. The ultimate in terraforming would
  be to create an uncontained planetary biosphere
  emulating all the functions of the biosphere of
  the Earthone that would be fully habitable for
  human beings. - Martyn J. Fogg
• Ecopoesis partial terraforming
• Biospheres and Terran ecosystem services

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Exploration/colonization

• ISS vs. Terran biospheres
• Materials imports and exports
• Lunar and Martian outposts
• Closed loop systems
• In-situ resource utilization
• Economic political pressures

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Earth-like Mars

• Ecosystem size, complexity and stability
• Interest in terraforming Mars
• Day length
• Year length and seasonality
• Land surface
• Surface gravity

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Alien Mars

• Mars is cold (-63 oC vs. 15 oC) (heat budget)
• The air is thin (6.4 mb)
• and unbreathable (95 CO2, N2, Ar, O2)
• No liquid water
• No global magnetic field

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Earth and Mars history
Multicellular life
Extant life???
Cold, dry planet
Atmospheric O2
CO2 sequestration
H2O loss
Climatic cycles, Plate techtonics
Magnetosphere loss
Techtonic shutdown
Core cooling
Early life
Early life????
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Mars today, re-examined

• Flotilla Pathfinder, MGS, Odyssey, Mars Express,
  MER Spirit Opportunity
• Polar icecaps water ice and CO2
• Subsurface water, Surface water(??)
• Implications for current water cycle
• Cycles of climate change
• Search for carbonates

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Mars terraforming goals

• Raised surface temperature ( 60oC)
• Increased mass of the atmosphere
• Availability of liquid water
• Protection from UV and cosmic rays
• Composition of atmosphere

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Runaway greenhouse effect

• CO2 and H2O reserves
• Polar CO2 dynamics
• Positive feedback mechanism to raise T and Pa
• Impacts on water cycle
• Unknowns reserve levels and formats, time
  constants

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Triggering the runaway

• Artificial greenhouse gas production
• Initial interest in CFCs
• Search for designer greenhouse gasses
• Unknowns effectiveness, lifespan, in-situ
  resource utilization issues

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Other triggers

• Change albedo of icecaps
• Orbital mirrors
• Cometary bombardment
• Nuclear explosions in regolith

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Atmospheric composition

• Results of greenhouse runaway
• How to oxygenate the atmosphere?
• Carbon cycle carbon sequestration needed
• Candidate primary producers for ecosystem
• How to build functional ecosystems??
• Time to build up O2 1000s of years
• Nitrogen issues

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Mars terraforming possibilities

• Planet can be warmed and the atmosphere thickened
• Easier to work outside and harvest resources
• Replicating Terran biospheres is much more
  difficult, and will not happen soon

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Environmental ethics
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Discussion time
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Environmental ethics concepts

• Obligations and restrictions
• Moral standing and moral agents
• Intrinsic vs. instrumental values
• Anthropocentrism
• Biocentrism
• Ecocentrism

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End of show
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Atmospheric heat budget
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Polar icecaps
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Subsurface water
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Recent surface water?
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Polar CO2 dynamics

• Relationships between Pa, T and Pv
• Stable and unstable equilibrium points

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Carbon Cycle
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Extremophiles
Cyanobacteria
Cryptoendoliths
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Ecosystems