Clouds on Mars (visible through backyard telescopes )

Earth and Mars are converging for a close encounter at the end of January 2010

Sometimes, pale blue orographic clouds can be seen hovering above ancient volcanoes on Mars.

Original link:
Link with animations

Not many comments, just encouraging people that own a telescope to keep the eyes on Mars and maybe post some interesting pictures o ATS.

[edit on 26-12-2009 by Romanian]

Great post!

The recent evidence from Phoenix highlights clouds in the Martian sky. I never knew the ice was significantly large at the Martian polars.

ah, double post

[edit on 26-12-2009 by infinite]

reply to post by Romanian


On this Earth clouds start forming by the evaporation of ponds, rivers, lakes,

and oceans and when this evaporation takes place clouds form at higher

elevations where the air pressure is lower. Water droplets form and a cloud

is born and if you are a meteorologist a more in depth scientific explanation

of how clouds form is available.


Lets talk about Mars. Is there water vapor on the planet and the answer is

yes. How much water vapor is available is the question. Clouds are definitely

forming and from Earth's telescopes, satellites circling Mars and ground zero

missions clouds are continually spotted.


What does this mean it means there is water and evaporating ice on Mars

originally thought by many not to be the case years ago. I will stand on my

beliefs only from what I see on the surface of Mars that life forms absolutely

exist on the surface of Mars. Who says that the life forms have to breath the

same air mixture as on Earth to survive on Mars.


I believe on Mars that some lifeforms use photosynthesis that are walking

around on that planet to stay alive. Anything is possible in this and other

universes. When I see lifeforms on Mars in pods it opens up many

possibilities of how they stay alive taking in carbon dioxide. The pods are

temporary I believe to take in nourishment and water into the body. Crazy

maybe but lets see who is right during the next 50 years. ^Y^





[edit on 26-12-2009 by amari]

Wow o.k

I always thought that the clouds on mars were a result of dust rather than water/ice evaporation. Ive only just started to get interested in astrology and star gazing so excuse my lack of knowlege.

So people now accept that there is water or water ice on mars?

I think you can see where im going here. Would it be enough to support any life?

reply to post by Algebra

You wrote "astrology", was that what you really wanted to write or was it "astronomy"?

Water vapour clouds on Mars have been known for some years (one of the probes orbiting Mars even has special filters on its camera to better show these clouds), and according to some scientists, what is happening is that the water ice on the south pole sublimates into water vapour, creates those clouds, the clouds move to the north and then it snows on the north pole, and this process would explain the periodical change in size of the polar ice caps.

Liquid water has never been identified on Mars, as far as I know.

Originally posted by Algebra
Wow o.k

I always thought that the clouds on mars were a result of dust rather than water/ice evaporation. Ive only just started to get interested in astrology and star gazing so excuse my lack of knowlege.

So people now accept that there is water or water ice on mars?


I think you can see where im going here. Would it be enough to support any life?

Millions of specs of dust will help when it comes to moisture attaching to

the dust particles to help form clouds on Mars. Some of the lifeforms on Mars

are very tiny and they do not need as much water to survive plus the

Androids that are on Mars need no water to survive. ^Y^

Originally posted by ArMaP
reply to post by Algebra

 

You wrote "astrology", was that what you really wanted to write or was it "astronomy"?

Water vapour clouds on Mars have been known for some years (one of the probes orbiting Mars even has special filters on its camera to better show these clouds), and according to some scientists, what is happening is that the water ice on the south pole sublimates into water vapour, creates those clouds, the clouds move to the north and then it snows on the north pole, and this process would explain the periodical change in size of the polar ice caps.

Liquid water has never been identified on Mars, as far as I know.

LOL yah you know what i mean.

So what your saying is there is water on mars but its either tied up in ice. and so could'nt support life.
In clouds as vapour and so could'nt support life. Or falling as snow which could support life if it accumulated and stayed liquid. Cool stuff.

On another note.

Could it support an expedition to mars? or do we not know how much there actualy is there.

reply to post by Algebra

The air pressure on Mars is too low to allow liquid water to remain at the surface for more that a few moments before it evaporates. On Earth, the air pressure actually pushes down on the water to keep it from evaporating. Water would "boil away" at room temperature on Earth if that water was placed in an airless vacuum -- there would be no air to push down on the water.

However, there could be liquid water below the surface of Mars -- and for the people who feel that liquid water must exist to support life, this sub-surface water could be the home to Martian microbial life.

[edit on 12/26/2009 by Soylent Green Is People]

reply to post by Algebra

I'm not sure, but I think that the known volume of water ice is really very large on the poles, with the possibility of more water ice below the surface in other areas, so I guess that's more than enough to support manned missions.

I believe that more than microbial life exists on Mars, everywhere we look on Earth, no matter what the conditions are, from extremely high temps, to the lowest, we find life, the Atmosphere makes no difference, one time on Earth, there was no Oxygen, but life still existed.

I believe any announcement made by anyone about the discovery of life anywhere in the Solar System, even though they will announce it as a new discovery, will be information they have known for a very long time, but announcing it as newly discovered gives them plausible deny ability, they had to make sure they couldn't make a profit from it before they told everyone else.

Just like if life does exist elsewhere, as the old saying goes, if there is one, there are others.

I agree that there definately has to be life out there somewhere and who knows maybe on mars. I always hoped we'd find it close like on mars or the moon even, so its within reach of further study. It would be of no use realy if we found life thousands or millions of light years from earth because the logistics of proper investigation would make it a very painfull process.

Not impossible though. Do you think microbial life would evolve in to a new species if we got it back here and subjected it to our conditions. This is a thought that really excites my imagination.

This is pretty irritating.. Why did it take this long to figure out there was water on mars. It's so obvious there is, and based on theories oof how water got on earth there is no reason to think it wouldn't exist pretty much everywhere in our solar system,

reply to post by mosesgunner

Why is it so obvious?

Originally posted by mosesgunner
This is pretty irritating.. Why did it take this long to figure out there was water on mars. It's so obvious there is, and based on theories oof how water got on earth there is no reason to think it wouldn't exist pretty much everywhere in our solar system,

To expand on what ArMap asked, what data did you use to positively confirm that water exists on Mars before NASA could confirm it?

...and, yes, water probably does exist in many, many places in the solar system (and has been detected in other places), but until that water is actually detected and confirmed to exist, a theory that water could exist "pretty much everywhere" is simply that -- a "theory".

It may be a good theory, but until it is successfully test, it's just a theory.

Furthermore, the theory of how water got to Earth may mean that Mars once had water, but that does not necessarily mean that the water is still there (although it is). It all could have been lost into space over the past few billion years.

Just because water can exist elsewhere in the solar system does not mean that it does exist everywhere.


[edit on 12/26/2009 by Soylent Green Is People]

I wonder... what would be the evaporation temperature of water when the "air pressure" has the value of the one we find on Mars?

they found life on mars already lol and water, they've found ancient lakes and small little critter fossils :O

reply to post by tinarg

That's easy to say, but is it really true?