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The martian soil as a planetary gas pump

Nature Physics volume 10, pages 17–20 (2014)Cite this article

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Abstract

Mars has an active surface, with omnipresent small dust particles and larger debris. With an ambient pressure below 10 mbar, which is less than 1% of the surface pressure on Earth, its CO2 atmosphere is rather tenuous. Aeolian processes on the surface such as drifting dunes, dust storms and dust devils are nevertheless still active1,2,3. The transport of volatiles below the surface, that is, through the porous soil, is unseen but needs to be known for balancing mass flows4,5. Here, we describe a mechanism of forced convection within porous soils. At an average ambient gas pressure of 6 mbar, gas flow through the porous ground of Mars by thermal creep is possible and the soil acts as a (Knudsen) pump. Temperature gradients provided by local and temporal variations in solar insolation lead to systematic gas flows. Our measurements show that the flow rates can outnumber diffusion rates. Mars is the only body in the Solar System on which this can occur naturally. Our laboratory experiments reveal that the surface of Mars is efficient in cycling gas through layers at least centimetres above and below the soil with a turnover time of only seconds to minutes.

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Figure 1: Particle trajectories above an illuminated dust bed consisting of basalt particles.
Figure 2: Velocities of a sample of tracer particles along their streamlines.
Figure 3: Simulation of particle velocities along their streamlines below and above the surface of the dust sample.
Figure 4: The natural soil pump on Mars.
Figure 5: Schematic diagram of the drop tower experiment.

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Acknowledgements

This project is supported by DLR Space Management with funds provided by the Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology (BMWi) under grant number DLR 50 WM 1242. T.J. and M.K. are supported by the DFG. Access to earlier microgravity experiments on parabolic flights leading to the development of the experiment was granted by DLR and ESA.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Physics, University of Duisburg-Essen, Lotharstraße 1, D-47048 Duisburg, Germany

    Caroline de Beule, Gerhard Wurm, Thorben Kelling, Markus Küpper, Tim Jankowski & Jens Teiser

Authors
  1. Caroline de Beule
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  2. Gerhard Wurm
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  3. Thorben Kelling
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  4. Markus Küpper
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  6. Jens Teiser
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Contributions

C.d.B. and J.T. designed the experiment. C.d.B. performed the experiment with help from G.W., T.K., M.K., T.J. and J.T. M.K. simulated the gas flow with help from G.W. C.d.B. and G.W. wrote the paper with input from T.K., M.K., T.J. and J.T.

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Correspondence to Caroline de Beule.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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de Beule, C., Wurm, G., Kelling, T. et al. The martian soil as a planetary gas pump. Nature Phys 10, 17–20 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphys2821

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