Andy Lloyd's Dark Star Blog 25, April 2015

Andy Lloyd's Dark Star Blog

Blog 25 (April 2015)

The Curious Waters of Mars

When Kerry Cassidy of Project Camelot interviewed me last month, she asked me about the isotopic ratio of water on Mars. Why is this seemingly small detail important to the question of Earth's origins, you might ask? I had been discussing how the water on Earth shares a similar isotopic signature to that of water analysed on bodies in the outer asteroid belt. Quixotically, it does not share the same signature with that of most comets, which raises serious questions about the format of the early solar system. Essentially, things seem to have been shaken up from how they first started. This might offer some evidence to suggest that the Earth began its life in the zone now occupied by the asteroid belt, between Mars and Jupiter. So you can see why the question of water on Mars came to mind during that discussion - at the time I did not have an answer.

Artist’s conception of water on ancient Mars. Image credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center

Recently, news has emerged of the discovery of liquid water on the surface of the red planet (1). Up until very recently, the suggestion that liquid water could exist on the surface of Mars was dismissed as ridiculous by scientists: The climate was too cold and arid, and the atmospheric pressure too low to provide the right environmental conditions to allow liquid water to exist. Yet, satellite surveys of the planet have provided strong evidence for the movement of water across the Martian terrain (2) and rounded pebbles have been found in dry river beds, implying erosion by the flow of river water over long time periods (3). The Martian climate may fluctuate wildly over time due to the high variation in the obliquity Mars' axis, and orbital parameters (2). Although Mars might seem settled and rather dull at the present time, it may simply be enduring a glacial period. But, despite how cold it currently is, the presence of liquid water appears to be just surface deep:

"The latest findings suggest that Martian soil is damp with liquid brine, due to the presence of a salt that significantly lowers the freezing point of water. When mixed with calcium perchlorate liquid water can exist down to around -70C, and the salt also soaks up water vapour from the atmosphere. New measurements [by Nasa’s Curiosity rover] from the Gale crater show that during winter nights until just after sunrise, temperatures and humidity levels are just right for liquid brine to form." (1)

Okay, so this new finding shows that liquid water can indeed exist on the surface of Mars, but only in the form of salty brines that percolate down through the soil. The presence of caustic perchlorate salts in the Martian soil attracts water from the atmosphere, particularly during the cold winter nights, and allows water to remain unfrozen, by significantly lowering its freezing point, rather than becoming the previously expected permafrost.

The distribution of known glaciers across the Martian surface

Image credit: Mars Digital Image Model, NASA/Nanna Karlsson

If liquid water can exist in the Martian soil in the equatorial Gale Crater, where the Curiosity rover made these findings, then it can exist most anywhere across the planet:

"Below 15cm, the subsurface conditions are compatible with the existence of permanently hydrated perchlorates, which, owing to the low mean temperature and the small diurnal and seasonal variations, are stable throughout the day and during all of the seasons at Gale crater. We...expect the upper layer of the ground to be drier in the daytime than the perenially hydrated lower layer."

"This detection at the equator (the driest and warmest region of the planet) of environmental conditions that can allow for transiently stable liquid brines defines a threshold condition for their presence. As perchlorates are widely distributed on the surface of Mars, this discovery implies that the rest of the planet should possess even more abundant brines owing to the expected greater atmospheric water content and lover temperatures." (4)

So much for the arid desert we were all promised. Now, the Nasa rovers are equipped with mass spectrometer and other bits of neat kit to allow them to do chemistry in situ. Byt taking samples and roasting them at various temperatures, then analysing the resultant gases, scientists can work out the composition of the soil. They can also work out the isotopic ratio of Martian water, i.e. the ratio between H2O and D2O, which varies from planet to planet. Analysis of some Martian soil has provided the following generalised data:

"Samples from the Rocknest aeolian deposit were heated to ~835°C under helium flow and evolved gases analyzed by Curiosity’s Sample Analysis at Mars instrument suite. H2O, SO2, CO2, and O2 were the major gases released. Water abundance (1.5 to 3 weight percent) and release temperature suggest that H2O is bound within an amorphous component of the sample. Decomposition of fine-grained Fe or Mg carbonate is the likely source of much of the evolved CO2. Evolved O2 is coincident with the release of Cl, suggesting that oxygen is produced from thermal decomposition of an oxychloride compound. Elevated ΔD values are consistent with recent atmospheric exchange. Carbon isotopes indicate multiple carbon sources in the fines. Several simple organic compounds were detected, but they are not definitively Martian in origin." (5)

Broken down further, we obtain the Hydrogen-Deuterium isotopic ratio:

"Hydrogen in all Rocknest samples is highly enriched in deuterium compared to terrestrial materials ... In addition, the Rocknest ΔD values are within the range of values observed by remote-sensing analysis of the Martian atmosphere where telescopic measurements from Earth have previously suggested a reservoir enriched in D by a factor of ~5 over terrestrial values." (5)

It is clear from this that the Deuterium levels on Mars are much greater than those on Earth, by a factor of 5. I find this curious. Why would the Earth have more in common with the asteroids in the outer asteroid belt than Mars, which is so much closer to us?

Mars's Jezero Crater was home to an ancient lake system.

The region around Jezero hosted at least two separate episodes of water activity.

Image credit: NASA/MSSS/ASU/GSFC

If the asteroids, Mars and Earth all had similar isotopic ratios of water, then that might be explainable as a generalised property of planets forming in the inner solar system. But, instead, there is significant variation, and not in the orderly manner one might expect. Perhaps I'm wrong in my underlying assumptions, but I understood that water (as a volatile) is driven away by the action of the early Sun's heat and radiation as the planets form (in much the same way as the comets out-gas huge amounts of volatiles when approaching perihelion). D2O is heavier than H2O, so D2O should survive this early onslaught better than H2O. Therefore, the more water is driven off, the more the isotopic ratio of water should increasingly favour the minority deuterium isotope of hydrogen in what remains. Assuming the extant water on a planet's surface is the remnant of what remains of a planet's primordial waters (and the substantial addition of comet water is now in doubt (6)), then the D/H ratio should be greater for planets closer to the Sun. So...why does Mars have such a richer vein of deuterium both in its atmosphere and in its soil? It almost seems like Mars should have been closer to the Sun than Earth in the early days of the solar system...

A reasonable counterpoint might centre around how unprotected Mars is from the action of the solar wind, despite its greater distance from the Sun: It lacks the protection afforded to Earth by its substantive magnetic field. Even so, this does not explain why there is such a good correlation between the Earth and the outer belt asteroids. Furthermore, it's now becoming clear that not only is there water on Mars, but there's actually likely to be a great deal of water on Mars. Far from being driven off due to the red planet's current thready atmosphere and dismal magnetic field, the water's still there!

On top of the voluminous water ice bound up in the two ice caps (7), new studies of the literally thousands of glaciers known to exist across the Martian surface have shown that these icy aqueous reservoirs alone hold enough to cover the entire surface a meter deep in water (8,9). That these non-polar rich deposits of water have not been lost over time is remarkable, and thought to be due to a protective covering of dust. Yet, the case for repeated episodes of water flow across the Martian landscape is firming up, with the discovery and subsequent geophysical study of an ancient lake system in the vicinity of the Jezero Crater (10). It's becoming increasingly clear that the movement of Martian water is episodic:

"...the difference in fan deposit mineralogy is a function of the areal exposure of the major geomorphic units within their watersheds. This indicates that the spectrally dominant aqueous alteration minerals in the fan deposits are primarily detrital, or transported, in nature and did not form in situ. We conclude that the aqueous alteration of the units in the watershed occurred prior to the fluvial activity that carved the valleys of the Jezero crater paleolake system, and that the two periods of aqueous activity are not genetically related." (11)

So, on the one hand we have the need for the water reservoirs (in the form of glaciers and generalised sub-surface salty brines) to be protected from exposure and thus loss from the planet; and on the other hand we have clear evidence of episodic water flows across the landscape, and a chaotic climate model linked to extreme variations in axial obliquity and orbit. These do not sit together well. Science has changed its tune dramatically in recent years as the evidence for hidden Martian water has emerged, which is to be welcomed. But, like with many of the other anomalies in the solar system, it still cannot piece the puzzle together as to what really happened during the early solar system.

It is clear to me that major catastrophism played a role common to the Earth, asteroid belt and, consequently, Mars. As a result, the cards in the solar system's deck were reshuffled. The isotopic ratios of water across the solar system provide us with an important clue to piecing the whole thing back together.

Written by Andy Lloyd, 17th April 2015

References:

1) Hannah Devlin "Nasa's Curiosity rover finds water below surface of Mars" 13 April 2015

theguardian.com article

2) Andy Lloyd "The Implications of Mars' Chaotic Tilt" 22 March 2015

Dark Star Blog 24

3) Andy Lloyd "A Martian Riddle" 22 September 2014

Dark Star Blog 18

4) F. Javier Martin-Torres et al. "Transient Liquid Water and Water Activity at Gale Crater on Mars", Nature Geoscience Letters, 8: 357–361, 13 April 2015,

nature.com articles

5) L. Leshin, et al. "Volatile, isotope and organic analysis of Martian fines with the Mars Curiosity Rover", Science, 341: 6153, 2013)

nasa.gov file

6) Andy Lloyd "The Asteroid/Comet Identity Crisis" 20 December 2014

Dark Star Blog 21

7) "Martian polar ice caps"

wikipedia.org/wiki/Martian_polar_ice_caps

8) Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen "Satellite Observations Reveal Glaciers of Frozen Water on Mars", 8 April 2015, with thanks to Mark

scitechdaily.com article

9) N. B. Karlsson, et al., “Volume of Martian mid-latitude glaciers from radar observations and ice-flow modelling,” Geophysical Research Letters, 42: 8, 28 April 2015

onlinelibrary.wiley.com abstract

10) Kevin Stacey "Ancient Martian lake system records two water-related events", 25 May 2015, with thanks to Lee

phys.org news

11) T. Goudge et al. "Assessing the Mineralogy of the Watershed and Fan Deposits of the Jezero Crater Paleolake System, Mars", Journal of Geophysical Research, 120: 4, April 2015

onlinelibrary.wiley.com article

Dr Netchitailo's paper is certainly a fascinating read, despite, I warn you, being liberally sprinkled with equations. His is a far-ranging cosmological theory. Among many other things, he uses his theory to explain the Pioneer anomaly - an intriguing effect whereby both of the Pioneer spacecraft began to slow down unexpectedly as they careered away from the solar system. The main focus of his theory is on 'macro-objects', like Active Galactic Nuclei, and how they might be composed of exotic materials:

So, does his theory also apply to more commonplace celestial objects, like stars? Well, yes it does, bringing forth the 'dark star' connection:

Dr Netchitailo suggests that highly dense Dark Stars might indeed exist, which are composed of a mixture of WIMPs (Weakly Interacting Massive Particles (7)) and neutralinos. These, he argues, combine within the Dark Star to annihilate one other, and in so doing generate internal 'Dark Matter heating'. I asked him whether these Dark Stars are actually dark, and he answered my question in this way:

I take that as a yes. This would make a lot of sense when one considers that 80% of the mass of the universe is 'missing', and is thought to be composed of Dark Matter. There is some compelling evidence for the existence of WIMPs (9), so is it not entirely possible that this missing mass is bound together in numerous small and undetectable Dark Stars spread across the universe? Is it possible that we have just such an object in our own neighbourhood? Maybe. However, theoretical physicists currently think of these particles in a similar way to cosmic rays - fast moving streams of high energy particles which can move through matter with impunity, and are, for all intents and purposes, invisible. Could they really be bound into an object as prosaic as a Dark Star? This requires a completely fresh look at the physics of the Universe - a path Dr Netchitailo is not afraid to tread.

I guess what I like about what Dr Netchitailo is trying to do is that the Dark Matter he's considering aggregates into clumps, some immense and powerful, some small and mysterious.

When scientists try to discover this stuff experimentally, they have little to go on besides a missing set of numbers in a series of equations, and their job is to fill the gaps. Because their mindset is particle physics, they assume that the properties of said mysterious particles are going to be found in the high energy end of physics - the kind of particles they look for in their accelerators. But why should this be so? Just because our immediate vicinity doesn't seem to have any Dark Matter objects in it (regular observation would suggest anyway - although perhaps the realm of the paranormal might suggest otherwise), that doesn't mean to say that these objects are not widespread about the galaxy. This, after all, is not antimatter we're talking about; there's no need to think that this stuff mutually annihilates when it comes into contact with matter. It might co-exist perfectly well with 'normal' matter, although it might, perhaps, be repelled from regular matter to clump together away from areas where regular matter clumps. Like oil and water; perhaps they don't mix too well, and dark Matter is somehow rejected from the solar system by the Sun. Maybe it's the 'interstellar fluff' Nasa like to describe, existing beyond the heliosphere and the solar system's plasma atmosphere within. Perhaps beyond the heliosphere of every star is an interstellar void dominated by Dark Matter. Perhaps these boundaries are more important than we realise?

We self-evidently can't see Dark Matter. The main property it has that we are aware of is mass. That, for me in my particular quest, is an exciting possibility. What the Dark Star I'm considering has is mass, (so that it can warm orbiting planets through tidal effects, and also perturb objects in the outer solar system) but besides that it seems to be able to keep off the radar pretty well. In other words, there's a common set of properties and sense of mystery between a missing Planet X body of some size, and proposed Dark Matter stars/planets/fluff. We can measure the mass effects of each, but not see them. Extrapolate Dark Matter objects that might lurk around star systems, or move through interstellar space independently, up to a galaxy level and that might account for a great deal of missing mass, especially if the core of galaxies themselves aren't actually black holes, but are massive reservoirs of Dark Matter instead.

I'm not saying he's right, I'm just intrigued about the possibility that in our assumptions that all of the bulky objects in the universe are made up of regular matter, we might be missing a whole additional category of (dark) objects hanging about in the blackness of space.

9) Michael Lemonick "Has the Missing 80% of the Universe’s Mass Been Found?" 5 April 2013

The idea of a "Snowball Earth" has been around for a while (1,2). The idea came about because of evidence of ancient glaciation in equatorial regions, thus implying global glaciation. This phenomenon was not likely to have been a single event, either, but rather an extreme and rare, but nonetheless periodic feature of our planet's climate. Central for the mechanism for such an extreme form of glaciation across the globe (naturally leading to immense destruction of the planet's biosphere) is the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, as well as changes to the distribution of landmasses across the globe.

At that time, the concept was still very controversial (4,5). But the evidence for global glaciation has increased, to the point where it is now questioned whether any oases of liquidity remained at all during at least one of the Snowball Earth occurrences:

Note how even the scientific proponents of this theory struggle with its actual repercussions. Yet, this is where the data directs us. (One does wonder, in the face of this kind of ancient natural extremity, what we get so worked up about when discussing 2-3 degrees of man-made global warming. It seems practically irrelevant by comparison). I stand by my analysis of 13 years ago: To achieve such an extreme effect by feedback loops alone seems almost preposterous. Despite the evidence for these events, sophisticated modelling fails to come up with Snowball Earth effects from theory:

"There have been difficulties in recreating a snowball Earth with global climate models. Simple GCMs with mixed-layer oceans can be made to freeze to the equator; a more sophisticated model with a full dynamic ocean (though only a primitive sea ice model) failed to form sea ice to the equator (4). In addition, the levels of CO2 necessary to melt a global ice cover have been calculated to be 130,000 ppm,(5) which is considered by some to be unreasonably large." (2)

I think the Snowball Earth effect calls for some kind of cosmic event. Some theorise that the Earth underwent some kind of axial alteration - perhaps a high obliquity event similar to that of Mars (7). Changes to the Sun's output might also have contributed. But an area that science seems less comfortable about exploring is the potential for Earth to have moved. While it is now commonplace to discuss the migration of the outer gas giants, the more tightly bound inner planets appear to be off-limits to these kinds of migratory effects. Perhaps that is because scientists cannot perceive of the mechanism, or causal factor, which might bring such a transitory migration about. It's a shame, because the migration of the Earth away from the Sun for a period of time would certainly help to explain the periodic Snowball Earth effect. And the reason? Orbital changes brought about by occasional interactions with the rogue Dark Star during perihelion.

4) Poulsen, C.J.; Pierrehumbert, R.T.; Jacob, R.L. "Impact of ocean dynamics on the simulation of the Neoproterozoic snowball Earth", Geophysical Research Letters 28 (8): 1575–8, 15 April 2001

5) Crowley, T.J.; Hyde, W.T.; Peltier, W.R. "CO2 levels required for deglaciation of a 'near-snowball' Earth", Geophysical Research Letters, 28 (2): 283–6, 1 January 2001

6) Irene Klotz "Earth Was Once a Snowball Locked in 'Crazy' Deep Freeze" 13 April 2015, with thanks to Lee

Thank you for taking some time to look over the information [about the 'Black Star' and its alleged effect on the solar system in the last few years]. The smoking gun evidence from March 12-13, 2012 with the magnetopause reversal and martian dust storm in combination with the Earth and Mars position relative to the Sun in Leo seems to point to the Dark/Black Star position moving left in the orbit diagram and in Leo at the very same time. The evidence is more impressive once you realize March 12, 2012 is one year and one day after Fukushima representing the Sun/Earth/Dark Star nearside-alignment quake event for the 2011 Earth Orbit Cycle. That means Earth and Mars were making ready to pass between the Sun and Dark Star, when magnetic portal connection convergence was taking place between the two stars. Portal-to-portal electromagnetic cross firing was taking place in the area of space between the Sun and Leo, which was responsible for the Sun producing X-class solar flares.

Not only did Earth magnetosphere turn around for 28 hours and the Martian dust storm kick up, but the Sun was reacting to the portal-to-portal cross firing and launching many big solar flares; as a natural defense mechanism and as Earth was passing between the two stars. The March/September big solar flare pattern has moved later in the year with each Earth Orbit Cycle indicating that the Dark Star is moving in prograde fashion left in the orbit diagram.

If you can provide some commentary by Thursday morning Eastern Time here in the USA, then I will post your views in the coming newsletter to be uploaded Thursday afternoon.

However, this all rather depends upon your initial round of assumptions. If one works on the basis that a cosmic body (black star) has indeed been moving through a perihelion passage over the last few years, then finding a causal link between these events (as well as the Fukishima earthquake you mentioned) and an interaction between the Sun and the interloper makes some sense. The late John Bagby proposed these kind of causal mechanisms many years ago (7) and I suspect that a stellar companion object would certainly be capable of creating these kinds of effects, were it to be moving through the solar system in the way you suggest. But the effects can also be attributable to other natural effects, meaning that these events in themselves do not provide proof of such an object's presence. I suggest, unfortunately, that we still lack a 'smoking gun'.

4) Ellie Zolfagharifard "Forget global warming, worry about the MAGNETOSPHERE: Earth's magnetic field is collapsing and it could affect the climate and wipe out power grids" 31 January 2014

7) Andy Lloyd "The Secrecy Surrounding the 1983 IRAS Discovery" 18 September 2014

This one is definitely a lens flare, Rene - you can see how is stands out against the clouds behind. But it does have something of a luminous quality about it.

The Daily Mail reported last month that a physicist would be presenting his paper about the nuclear destruction of an alien civilisation on Mars to the 46th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in Houston, 16-20th March 2015:

It's a huge, and serious, scientific conference, so such a sensational hypothesis would have made quite a splash, one might imagine. Reading the Daily Mail article, one imagines a huge hall of top boffins restlessly listening to such a theory being expounded, with a great deal of murmuring and tutting from the back. One imagines a lively Q&A, with the ensuing discussion noisily spilling over into the restaurants and bars beyond. One of our regular contributors on the Dark Star Planet X forum, Gita, wondered how the presentation had actually gone, and I duly looked up the conference website to see.

From what I can gather, Dr Brandenburg's presentation did indeed take place. His paper (2) is listed among the very many papers presented at the conference, taking the form of a 'poster presentation' in the Town Centre Exhibit Area. It was one amongst 34 similar presentations that evening (3). I'm sure Dr Brandenburg did a great job of getting his ideas across to the many scientists who showed interest in his stall, but this rather deflated what I had (perhaps naively) imagined on the back of the Daily Mail article.

So what of his theory? Looking at anomalous concentrations of radioactive materials across the Martian surface, Dr Brandenburg presents three possible alternative explanations (having excluded the possibility of a 'natural nuclear reactor'):

His ideas appear rather more sober in this extract than in the Daily Mail article, which describes a clash of Martian civilisations, and an existential threat posed to us here on Earth. If I was going to put money on one of his three suggested viable hypotheses, I'd go for the TIFRA one. Were this to be the case, then that puts the danger of similar asteroidal impacts occurring here on Earth into sharp focus. A Tunguska-type event is bad enough - but add into the mix a widespread rain of lethal radioactive debris and one has serious cause for concern.

Another potential side-effect of this hypothesis is that there are asteroid bodies out there which are rich in fissionable materials; which is surely a major target for space mining in the future. You would have thought that this would have grabbed their attention...

The Mahabharata (4) clearly describes a catastrophic blast that rocked the continent:

1) Jonathan O'Callaghan "Were Martians wiped out by a nuclear bomb? Physicist to present new evidence for bizarre theory at Nasa conference" 17 March 2015, with thanks to Lee

2) J. Brandenburg "Evidence for Large, Anomalous Nuclear Explosions on Mars in the Past" 46th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference, 2015

3) LPSC 2015 "Poster Session 1: Geochemistry and Petrology of Martian Meteorites" 17 March 2015 6pm [T624]

As the first of several murals for Linden Primary School in Gloucester, I was commissioned to paint a life-size Linden tree on the wall in their main hall in April 2015. There was a suitable space in the hall to accommodate a tree that was about 18' high, and 15' across - a not inconsiderable undertaking, requiring a scaffolding platform to work from.

Because of the size of the painting, there was the additional danger that a dark green tree would suck a lot of light out of the room, particularly in the winter. Therefore, we agreed that the tree would have a watermark effect to it, rather than a more realistic range of traditional greens. The hope was that the tree would blend in to the hall and, despite its size, remain in the background.

What made this particularly challenging for me was that I'm not great with heights! Producing a mural of this size also requires a fair bit of forethought - It would be difficult to mix colours in situ, for instance, transporting pots of paint and containers up the scaffolding. Instead, I mixed the paints (acrylic colours into standard matt emulsion) into jam jars and painted from a fairly limited range of colours when up high.

On the floor level, I was able to extend the range of colours a bit, and create a more realistic field of grass along with the tree trunk, in order to produce some depth and contrast to the mural. The overall effect is very striking, not least because of the size of the piece. It fits well within the space, and provides an iconic motif for the Linden School hall without becoming overly dominant.

The Linden Tree is a fairly distinctive tree, having a roughly conical shape and a thin trunk. This part of Gloucester had a fair few of them at one time. It was good to be able to put one back!