NASA’s
next mission is to Mars to answer the question: What happened to the air on
Mars? This question will help scientists learn about the evolution of Mars. Scientists
believe that when Mars was young it had a thick layer of air. This kept Mars
warm and wet. Somehow the atmosphere went away and today Mars doesn’t have any
air. Scientists believe that air molecules either have gone up into space or went
down and were transformed into rocks. This process was most likely initiated by
the radiation coming from the Sun or by the solar winds. To collect information
about the atmosphere on Mars, NASA is sending a probe, Maven, to Mars. Maven
will collect some scientific information on how the atmosphere is disappearing.
First, it will go around Mars. It should take the probe less than 5 hours to orbit
the planet. Then Maven will climb 3,860 miles above the planet. After that, it
will swoop down within 93 miles of the surface. On its way down, the probe will
collect some particles from the upper atmosphere and from the solar winds. The
collected particles will help scientists learn not only why Mars’s atmosphere
is disappearing, but also the rate at which the atmosphere is diminishing.
The
study of Mars’s atmosphere is very important. We want to find out if at one
point Mars had plenty of air and if it was a place friendly for life. Based on
the data collected by Maven the scientists can figure out when air existed on
Mars and why it disappeared. It is also important for us to learn about this
because we don’t want the same thing to happen to Earth.
The
article was very educational. It was well written and included a lot of
details. Before reading the article I didn’t know that Mars had an atmosphere
and that it didn’t have any air. The article should give additional information
on how these findings will help us to understand the evolution of other
planets. I think that this article was very interesting and I would love to
learn more about Mars.
Chang,
Kenneth. "Probe May Help Solve Riddle of Mars's Missing Air." The
New York Times. N.p., 15 Nov. 2013. Web. 10 Dec. 2013.
Emily,
ReplyDeleteI really liked your current event article. It was really interesting to read about Mars’ previously atmosphere and NASA’s plan to figure out what happened. It was interesting to read about how a planet could have changed so drastically and what could have caused that change. It is also interesting to read about the technology NASA is planning to use to gain the information needed. This article leaves me wondering what they will discover from their mission to send a probe around Mars. I also wonder if any of the assumptions NASA’s scientists made are going to end up being correct. I really liked how you explained everything within your current event article because I feel that overall it was very clear. You also connected things nicely to why they are important today. It would be important to know if the same thing could possibly happen to Earth sometime in the future. I think you could have just worked on making your relevance paragraph and review paragraph a little bit longer. Ultimately, I really enjoyed your current event article.
Great job, I like how you chose an article about something that will happen in the future not something that recently happened. I think it is very interesting that it is believed Mars had an atmosphere and the mystery of how it disappeared. Also, including what the scientist think could have happened to it, for example the air molecules going up into space or down and transformed into rocks. I enjoyed reading about the probe NASA is planning to use, Maven. Going into detail about Maven's mission and how it will help scientists was a great idea really giving a good idea of what is projected to happen. I learned that Mars may have had an atmosphere, I had no idea and have always just though of it as dry and lifeless. I never considered the idea that it may have had air at one point. I also found it intriguing that some believe the same thing could happen to Earth, this is very important for obvious reasons. Your relevance paragraph could have included a little more detail along with the review paragraph. I think it would have been cool if you said what the risks are of the mission, but maybe the article didn't include that information. Overall, great job.
ReplyDeleteThis is actually really interesting! I never would have thought that Mars had once had air and, seemingly, was similar to Earth in a few ways. I also did not know that the air could be turned into rocks? That's really pretty cool. This is really interesting and I'm really interested to see how this all turns out!
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