What processes influence weather on Mars and what can this teach us about Earth’s weather patterns? This is what a recent study published in AGU Advances hopes to address as an international team of researchers conducted a first-time analysis of what’s called the radiant energy budget (REB) for Mars, with REB used to measure incoming solar energy and outgoing thermal energy across planetary bodies. This study has the potential to help scientists better understand how REB influences weather patterns on Mars, specifically the periodic global dust storms that could harm robotic explorers and future human missions and was responsible for the NASA Opportunity rover’s end of mission.
For the study, the researchers measured REB at every latitude and every season of Mars with the goal of ascertaining global REB balance and how this compares to Earth’s REB. Data for the study was obtained with the Mars Global Surveyor Thermal Emission Spectrometer (MGS-TES) and processed through the NASA’s Clouds and the Earth's Radiant Energy System Energy Balanced and Filled (CERES‐EBAF). If a planet’s incoming solar energy is greater than the outgoing thermal energy, the planet has a REB surplus, and vice versa.
In the end, the researchers found that the REB between Mars and Earth exhibit completely opposite behaviors. For example, Earth’s tropical and polar regions experience an energy surplus and deficit, respectively, while Mars experiences the opposite energy behavior in those regions. These weather patterns could be responsible for triggering Mars’ global dust storms with the energy surplus occurring in the southern hemisphere, resulting in these dust storms continuing to alter the weather patterns across the surface of the Red Planet.
Diagram showing the REB of Mars and Earth. (Credit: Univ. of Houston Dept. of Physics)
“The interaction between dust storms and the REB, as well as with polar ice dynamics, brings to light the complex feedback processes that likely shape Martian weather patterns and long-term climate stability,” said Larry Guan, who is a graduate student in the Department of Physics at the University of Houston and lead author of the study.
Going forward, the researchers aspire to analyze long-term implications for Mars’ weather patterns and climate evolution stemming from the REB.
What new discoveries will researchers make about weather patterns on Mars in the coming years and decades? Only time will tell, and this is why we science!
As always, keep doing science & keep looking up!
Sources: AGU Advances, EurekAlert!, University of Houston
