NEW DELHI: Solar wind may have led to March loses its atmosphere, according to a computer simulation study that confirms the long belief that planets need a protective magnetic field to block such harmful radiation in order to sustain life.
Although factors such as the existence of a moderately hot, humid atmosphere and liquid water determine whether a planet can house life, the study, published in the monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, noted that the ability of planets to Generating magnetic fields around them is an overlooked aspect.
According to scientists Arnab Basak and Dibyendu Nandi of the Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research (IISER) Kolkata, these magnetic fields enveloping planets can act as a protective umbrella and protect the atmosphere from the super-fast plasma winds of the sun.
On Earth, they say, a geo-dynamo mechanism generates the planet’s protective magnetosphere – an invisible shield that prevents the solar wind from eroding our atmosphere.
In the present study, the scientists used two scenarios of the Red Planet – one considers a young Mars with its magnetosphere intact, and the other with the planet without this force field.
The simulations revealed that the magnetosphere in the young Mars may have acted as a shield that prevented the solar wind from getting too close to the planet’s atmosphere and thus protecting it.
Without an intrinsic magnetosphere, the researchers said that the magnetic field of the solar wind may have first draped and slipped past Mars, carrying away parts of the planet’s atmosphere and eventually eroding it completely.
They said the findings confirm the belief that the magnetospheres around planets play an important role in determining their ability to sustain life.
Alternatively, planets that lose their magnetic field eventually become inhospitable with the loss of their atmosphere, the scientists added.
According to the researchers, the study has important implications for the search for habitable exoplanets through initiatives such as NASAJames Webb’s Space Telescope and ISROsee ExoWorlds mission.
