Large solar storm sparks global aurora on Mars:

Large solar storm sparks global aurora on Mars:

An unexpected event

• An unexpectedly strong solar storm hit Mars in September, sparking a global aurora and doubling radiation levels on the red planet.
  
• Strangely, it occurred in conjunction with a spate of solar activity during what is usually a quiet period in the Sun’s 11-year sunspot and storm-activity cycle.
  
• The current solar cycle has been an odd one, with less activity than usual during the peak, and now we have this large event as we’re approaching solar minimum
  
• The solar event sparked an aurora more than 25 times brighter than any previously seen by the MAVEN orbiter

RAD

• The event produced radiation levels on the surface more than double any previously measured by the Curiosity Rover’s Radiation Assessment Detector (RAD) since that mission’s landing in 2012.
• RAD monitored radiation levels inside the encapsulated spacecraft that carried Curiosity from Earth to Mars in 2011 and 2012 and has been steadily monitoring the radiation environment at Mars’ surface for more than five years.
• RAD findings strengthen understanding of radiation’s impact on Mars habitability, a key objective of the Curiosity mission.
• NASA is also using RAD findings for planning the safety of human-crew missions to Mars.

Radiations

• Highly energetic solar events can significantly increase the radiation that penetrates through the atmosphere to the Mars surface.
  
• The increased radiation also interacts with the atmosphere to produce additional, secondary particles, which need to be understood and shielded against to ensure the safety of future human explorers.
  
• To protect our astronauts on Mars in the future, we need to continue to provide this type of space weather monitoring there.
  

Solar storm

• Solar storms are a variety of eruptions of mass and energy from the solar surface.
  
• Flares, prominences, sunspots, coronal mass ejections are the common harbingers of solar activity.
  
• They all involve sudden releases of stored magnetic energy, which accelerates the hot gases near the surface or in the corona of the Sun.
  
• Sometimes these particles make it all the way to the Earth and beyond by flowing along the Sun’s magnetic field into interplanetary space.
• When the material collides with the Earth’s magnetic field and trapped radiation belts, it can dump particles into our upper atmosphere to cause the Aurora.
• The same ‘charged’ particles can produce their own magnetic fields which can modify the Earth’s magnetic field and affect compass readings.
  

Aurora

• It is a natural electrical phenomenon characterized by the appearance of streamers of reddish or greenish light in the sky, especially near the northern or southern magnetic pole.
  
• The effect is caused by the interaction of charged particles from the sun with atoms in the upper atmosphere.
  
• In northern and southern regions, it is respectively called Aurora Borealis or Northern Lights and Aurora Australis or Southern Lights.
  

Maven

• Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution Mission (MAVEN) is a space probe developed by NASA designed to study the Martian atmosphere while orbiting Mars.

Curiosity

• With its rover named Curiosity, Mars Science Laboratory mission is part of NASA’s Mars Exploration Program, a long-term effort of robotic exploration of the red planet.
• Curiosity was designed to assess whether Mars ever had an environment able to support small life forms called microbes.
  
• In other words, its mission is to determine the planet’s “habitability.”