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Living Room / Re: Robert A. Heinlein - atmospheric processor question
« on: August 14, 2015, 05:54 PM »
^Found it: The Ringworld Engineers;
Original question: "I have a new question; what altitude on Earth would correspond to air pressure on Mars at ground level?
IOW, how high above the Earth would you have to go, to match the same low atmospheric air pressure on Mars at ground level?
10 miles above the Earth? 20?
50,000 feet up? 100,000 feet up?"
At the above link at 'The Ringworld Engineers', quote:
"In order to create the rarefied atmosphere on Mars, the Map of Mars was built to an altitude 20 miles (32 km) above the main Ringworld surface creating a 1,120,000,000-cubic-mile (4.7×109 km3) cavity."
20 miles = 105,600 feet
And, touching back on the original question of colonizing and terraforming Mars, I saw in a recent video documentary about Earth's interior (which I can't find now), that Mars has virtually no magnetic field to protect its atmosphere and surface from the intense solar radiation which results in Aurorae in the Earth's atmosphere/skies at the extreme northern & southern latitudes.
Mars is rust-colored for the obvious reason that its rocks are loaded with iron.
I wonder if the technology could be devised, to realign the magnetic orientation of the rocks north-south and use that to help simulate a magnetic field.
But the only known way, with Earth as an example, is for molten lava to cool in a preexisting magnetic field.
IOW, to magnetically 'polarize' solid rock by temporarily transforming it into a molten state in the presence of a magnetic field, which is neither practical nor feasible for Mars.
So as fast as you could generate atmosphere on Mars, the Sun would be working to break it down and dissipate it into outer space.
BTW, the Earth's Interior documentary said the Earth's magnetic field is weakening at an accelerating rate, especially near the Equator and the Atlantic between Brazil and northwest Africa.
Original question: "I have a new question; what altitude on Earth would correspond to air pressure on Mars at ground level?
IOW, how high above the Earth would you have to go, to match the same low atmospheric air pressure on Mars at ground level?
10 miles above the Earth? 20?
50,000 feet up? 100,000 feet up?"
At the above link at 'The Ringworld Engineers', quote:
"In order to create the rarefied atmosphere on Mars, the Map of Mars was built to an altitude 20 miles (32 km) above the main Ringworld surface creating a 1,120,000,000-cubic-mile (4.7×109 km3) cavity."
20 miles = 105,600 feet
And, touching back on the original question of colonizing and terraforming Mars, I saw in a recent video documentary about Earth's interior (which I can't find now), that Mars has virtually no magnetic field to protect its atmosphere and surface from the intense solar radiation which results in Aurorae in the Earth's atmosphere/skies at the extreme northern & southern latitudes.
Mars is rust-colored for the obvious reason that its rocks are loaded with iron.
I wonder if the technology could be devised, to realign the magnetic orientation of the rocks north-south and use that to help simulate a magnetic field.
But the only known way, with Earth as an example, is for molten lava to cool in a preexisting magnetic field.
IOW, to magnetically 'polarize' solid rock by temporarily transforming it into a molten state in the presence of a magnetic field, which is neither practical nor feasible for Mars.
So as fast as you could generate atmosphere on Mars, the Sun would be working to break it down and dissipate it into outer space.
BTW, the Earth's Interior documentary said the Earth's magnetic field is weakening at an accelerating rate, especially near the Equator and the Atlantic between Brazil and northwest Africa.