History of Mars and its Effect on the Future of Humans

You all have most likely heard about possibilities of expanding the human race towards Mars. There have been many speculations that Mars could possibly be habitable for life. These speculations began many years ago. To learn more about why we have had curiosities of the possibility of having life on Mars, we need to go back to the start of Mars' history.

Mars formed around 4.5 billion years ago when the Solar System was just being formed. Mars’ history can be broken down into three main geologic eras. The Noachian Period was the first period of Mars’ history. During this time it was a warm and wet planet that had liquid water in the forms of rivers and possibly large oceans. Mars also had a thick atmosphere and an active magnetic field. The magnetic field protected the atmosphere which retained enough heat to sustain liquid water. Over billions of years, Mars’ core cooled and it cooled much more rapidly since it was much smaller than Earth. The cooling of the core led to the collapse of the magnetic field. This occurs during the Hesperian Period which occurred next around 3.7 to 3 billion years ago. Without its protective magnetic field, the solar flares from the Sun stripped away the atmosphere leading to Mars cooling even faster. The liquid water evaporated and now Mars is the cold, dry, and arid red planet that we see today.

Scientists suspected that during the Noachian Period the thick atmosphere, magnetic field, and the liquid water could hold life for microorganisms. Today NASA still sends rovers to Mars to collect rock samples which may preserve the clues to Mars’ past and its biological history. Using these rock samples scientists will hopefully in the near future be able to determine if Mars ever had life in its past. Looking at Mars helps us learn more about Earth’s own origins. Using what we know and find on Mars, we can learn more about what makes Earth unique and how life here was able to be sustained in the early history of our planet. This is why these missions to Mars are so important for scientists and the entire race of humanity. If we can learn what makes our planet biologically unique it may open new doors that help us find extraterrestrial life somewhere outside our Solar System. This may also help us figure out if Mars may become another home for us in the future as Earth is losing its finite resources.

Sources:How Mars Lost Its Magnetic Field—and Then Its Oceans - JSTOR Daily Life on Mars - Wikipedia Was There Life on Mars? - NASA Science