How does Mars influence Earth’s climate cycles? This is what a recent study published in the Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific hopes to address as a trio of researchers from the United States, United Kingdom, and Australia investigated how the gravitational interactions between Earth and Mars help alter the former’s climate evolution. This study has the potential to help scientists better understand how external processes influence planetary habitability and what this could mean for finding life beyond Earth.
For the study, the researchers used a series of computer models to simulate Earth Milankovitch cycles, which are changes in Earth’s eccentricity (orbit shape), obliquity (axial tilt), and precession (axial wobble) over hundreds of thousands of years. Specifically, the researchers aspired to ascertain how gravitational interactions with Mars could influence these cycles, including climate evolution like ice ages.
In the end, the researchers found that Mars not only influences Earth’s orbital patterns and behavior, but that the solar system’s architecture influences each other’s orbital patterns, and this could have implications for searching for Earth-like exoplanets. This comes despite Mars being approximately half the size of Earth.
“I knew Mars had some effect on Earth, but I assumed it was tiny,” said Dr. Stephen Kane, who is a professor of planetary astrophysics at UC Riverside and lead author of the study. “I’d thought its gravitational influence would be too small to easily observe within Earth’s geologic history. I kind of set out to check my own assumptions.”
Regarding how this could influence exoplanets, Dr. Kane noted, “When I look at other planetary systems and find an Earth-sized planet in the habitable zone, the planets further out in the system could have an effect on that Earth-like planet’s climate.”
This study comes as the number of confirmed exoplanets recently surpassed 6,000, with just over 200 being designated as rocky planets like Earth. Therefore, this study could open the door for exploring other parameters when searching for Earth-like worlds beyond our solar system, and specifically how planets in their solar system could influence its orbit and habitability.
What new insight into Earth and Mars interactions and climate cycles will researchers make 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: Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, UC Riverside News
Featured Image Credit: NASA