Mars
Mars is the fourth planet in the
solar system and has two moons, Phobos and Deimos. Mars probably got its name
from the Greeks because of its red colour. In Greek mythology Mars is Ares, the
god of war. Mars has been known and studied for a long time. It has been studied
a lot from here at Earth itself. But Mars is a difficult planet to study
completely from Earth because it is so tiny. Click on one of the moons or the
planet itself to learn more about it.
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Distance from the sun: 227,940,000
km
Diameter: 6,794 km
Mass: 6.421923 kg
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Mars has constantly been visited
by spacecrafts. The first spacecraft to visit Mars was the Mariner 4. After that
Mars has been visited by numerous spacecrafts like: Mars Pathfinder, Mars Global
Surveyor, Mars Odyssey, Mars Express and the Mars 2 which was the first
spacecraft to land on Mars.
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Facts:
Mars 2:
After orbiting Mars for almost a
day (18 hours) the spacecraft made its descent and landed on the Martian
surface, becoming the first spacecraft to land on the planet. Mars 2 sent a
tremendous amount of information, for example, about the atmosphere. The
spacecraft was launched on the 19th of May 1971 and it started orbiting Mars on
the 27th of November 1971.
Pathfinder:
The Mars Pathfinder was the first spacecraft to Mars to have rovers. It took exactly seven months to reach Mars, leaving on 4th December 1996 and reaching on 4 July 1997. The spacecraft was equipped with lots of various scientific instruments to study many things on Mars.
Odyssey:
The Mars Odyssey is a spacecraft
that is even now fulfilling its purpose of finding traces of water and hence
finding out whether life exists on Mars. It was launched on the 7th of April
2001 and arrived at the red planet on the 24th of October 2001.
Global Surveyor:
The Mars Global Surveyor is a
spacecraft that used to send a lot of information that was very helpful in the
scientists study of Mars. Unfortunatly, on 2nd November 2006, the spacecraft
stopped responding. Lots of attempts have been made in an effort to solve the
problem. It was launched on 7th November 1996.
Mariner 4:
The Mariner 4 was a fly by
spacecraft and did not land on Mars. It was the first spacecraft to Mars and
hence provided the first pictures of the planet. The spacecraft took seven and a
half months to reach the planet, leaving on the 28th November 1964 and flying by
Mars on 14th July 1965. It took a whole week to transmit just 21 pictures at an
8 bit per second transfer rate!
Express:
The Mars Express was recently
launched spacecraft in order to find traces of living organisms on Mars. The
spacecraft is made up of two components: the Mars Express Orbiter which orbits
Mars and the Beagle 2 which lands on Mars and performs various tests. It was
launched on 2 June 2003 and entered the Martian orbit on 25 December 2003. On 6
February 2004, contact was lost with the lander, Beagle 2.
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Landscape of Mars
Mars has the most beautiful
landscape you may have ever seen. It has mountains, canyons and all sorts of
things that may not be found on any other planet in the solar system. Recent
finding lead to the possibility that there once may have been fluid on Mars. You
might all think that it is water that must have been on Mars, but it could have
been any other fluid. These findings also show that there might once have been a
sea on Mars. Valles Marineris was not created by flowing fluid and erosion. It
was created by the stretching of the Martian crust.
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Martian Atmosphere
The Martian atmosphere is very much like Earth’s and contains a lot of carbon
dioxide which takes up 95.3% percent of the atmosphere. But it doesn’t contain
enough carbon dioxide to maintain a Greenhouse Effect and is therefore much
colder than Earth. Another problem with Mars’ atmosphere is the lack of oxygen.
Only 0.15% of atmosphere on Mars is made up of oxygen. The planet’s atmosphere
also composes tiny amounts of gases like 2.7% of nitrogen, 1.6% of argon and
0.03% of water vapor.
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The name Deimos would have
probably originated from the Greeks. In Greek mythology, Deimos is one of the
sons of the god Ares (Mars) and the god Aphrodite (Venus). Deimos and Phobos are
both so small that they might have been asteroids that were thrown by Jupiter
towards Mars which got them into orbit.
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Fact File
Distance from Mars: 23,459 km
Diameter: 12.6 km (15 x 12.2 x 11)
Mass: 1.815 kg
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The name Phobos would have
probably originated from the Greeks. In Greek mythology, Phobos is one of the
sons of the god Ares (Mars) and Aprhodite (Venus). Phobia comes from Phobos.
Phobos orbits Mars at a high speed so it appears twice in a single Martian day.
Phobos is so close to Mars that it is constantly being pulled closer and closer
by 1.8m per century. So in 50 million years Phobos will crash into Mars or break
up to form a ring around Mars.
Phobos is the first Martian moon
and is the innermost. It is larger than Deimos. One interesting fact about
Phobos is that it the closest moon to the planet it belongs to in the whole
solar system.
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Fact File
Distance from Mars: 5981 km
Diameter: 22.2 km
Mass: 1.0816 kg
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Did You Know?
1.The name of the month March
comes from Mars.
2.The surface area of Mars is the same as the land surface area of Earth even
though Mars is much smaller.
3.The southern hemisphere of Mars is much more cratered and “old” than the
nothern hemisphere of Mars which has many more plains and is “young”.
4.The atmospheric pressure on Mars is only 1% of Earth’s
5.Two moons of Mars have been discovered.-Phobos and Deimos.
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