Could Mars Be Our Second Home?

Mars is the fourth planet from the sun and is also known as the Red Planet. (Image credit: Future/Tobias Roetsch)

Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun. It’s often called the “Red Planet” due to its surface color caused by oxidation of iron minerals on the Martian dirt. Seeing the red surface as blood, the Romans named this planet Mars, after the God of War.

Today, if you look beyond the color of Mars’ surface, it resembles nothing like a war zone but more of a futuristic planet. Today, robot explorers roam its surface collecting clues of its past in an effort to determine if life ever existed on this planet. 

As a rugged and cold desert world with a very thin atmosphere, Mars is very inhospitable to humans. But, billions of years ago, Mars is believed to have had rivers, lakes and even possibly an ocean. Though they no longer exist on this planet, scientists see traces of ancient riverbeds and minerals that once could have sustained life. 

So, given Mars’ current environment, why do scientists believe that this planet could be our second home? 

According to the European Space Agency (ESA), Mars’ atmosphere is thin and mostly made up of carbon dioxide (95.3%), nitrogen (2.7%) argon (1.6%), and oxygen (0.13%) so humans cannot breathe this Martian air. However, scientists are exploring the possibility of generating oxygen from the predominantly carbon dioxide atmosphere. In 2021, the rover used its MOXIE (short for “Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment”) to successfully convert carbon dioxide to oxygen on Mars. Despite the promising results, scientists believe a lot more work needs to be done to see humans on Mars. In addition to MOXIE, NASA and other space agencies are also testing life-support systems, radiation shields, and housing that could sustain humans in Mars’ harsh environment as well as trying to grow plants inside sealed habitats. Scientists are hopeful that advancements in these areas could make Mars a viable place for humans to live.

Scientists have also discovered polar ice caps made of water and carbon dioxide and if there are enough water sources on Mars, this could be a crucial determinant for whether life is possible and was possible on Mars. 

There are similarities between Earth and Mars that makes Mars an attractive planet as our second home. Mars orbits around the sun in 24.6 hours, so the day and night cycles are very similar to ours.  Mars also has four seasons like we do but their seasons last twice as long as ours as it takes Mars twice as long in Earth years to orbit the sun. 

In summary, Mars offers a mix of challenges and opportunities. But as our technology advances and allows us to meet those challenges, human life on Mars is becoming increasingly possible.