On September 24, India created history as India's first Mars mission made its successful entry into the orbit of Mars planet in an epic moment for Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO). Few days back on September 21, NASA's MAVEN spacecraft had also successfully entered Mars' orbit, where it will now prepare to study the Red Planet's upper atmosphere.
With this, India joins a small group of nations - United States, Russia and Europe - that have successfully sent probes to orbit or land on Mars. Others, however, failed several times initially. Let us have a look why Mars is the favourite planet for the space scientists across the world.
There are eight planets in our Solar System--Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. Each planet has their characteristics and they can be further divided into two parameters- terrestrials and gas and ice giants.
Terrestrials: Planets that are similar to Earth, with bodies largely composed of rock are Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars.
- Mercury is the smallest terrestrial and smallest planet in the Solar System. It is also closest to sun, making is too hot and thus it is not even possible to think of visiting this planet.
- Venus is also called as Earth's "sister planet", due to its similar size, gravity, and bulk composition. It is closest planet to the Earth, but it is radically different from Earth in other respects. It has the densest atmosphere of the four terrestrial planets, consisting of more than 96% carbon dioxide. Venus is by far the hottest planet in the Solar System. It has no carbon cycle to lock carbon back into rocks and surface features, nor does it seem to have any organic life to absorb carbon in biomass.
Gas and Ice giants: This includes Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. These planets are largely composed of gaseous material and significantly more massive than terrestrials.
- Jupiter is the planet from the sun and is the largest planet in the Solar System. Jupiter is primarily composed of hydrogen with a quarter of its mass being helium. It may also have a rocky core of heavier elements, but it lacks a well-defined solid surface.
- Saturn is the second largest planet and wind speeds on Saturn can reach 1,800 km/h
Ice giants: This category comprises of Uranus and Neptune and is a sub-class of gas giants. They have significantly lower mass, and are also depleted in hydrogen and helium in their atmospheres together with a significantly higher proportion of rock and ice. Both the planets are too cold to be explored for the chances of life.
Mars have certain factors that make it the most vulnerable planet to be explored by the space scientists. Following are the few reasons:
- Mars is at the ideal distance from the Earth, as it is neither too close nor too far
- Earth is tilted at 23.5 degrees, while Mars is also tilted at 25.2 degrees
- Length of the day is almost same with 24:39:35 against 2400 hours on the Earth
- Temperature are also expected to hover between -100°C and 27°C
- It is believed that Mars possesses several gasses that are similar to the Earth. Some are Carbon Dioxide, Argon, Methane. Traces of Oxygen are also expected on the planet
- Weather is likely to be similar to the Earth, in terms of extreme cold. However, Mars is much colder than the Earth
- Signs of frozen water have also been found
