MARTIAN GLOBAL DUST STORMS & MICROORGANISMS

        Our interests center on Mars and in learning how to safely explore it and exploit its resources. As such we will examine in detail what's known about the current (2018) Global Dust Storm that is blacking out the sky at the Mars Expedition Rover (MER) Opportunity and at the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) Curiosity Rover. There are two versions of this article. One, written by my father, includes the Torah Code. Ths one, published conjunctimn with him and our Italian partner, Marco de Marco, leaves Codes out. Marco is opposed to manned landings on Mars because he worries about cross biological contamination of both worlds. Before studying the dust storm issue my father and I tended to dismiss that threat. But if biological organisms are playing a role in dust lifting on Mars, then we would have to urge NASA to proceed with extreme caution. The hypothesis that there is a link between primitive life and lifting of dust is my father's. The suggestive evidence that he discusses wil be brought forward and examined here. Both versions of the article will be updated on a continuing basis as new information comes out, especially after the end of the 2018 Martian Global Dust Storm. In this version of the article we will first examine the most widely accepted explanation of dust storms on Mars - Saltation. Saltation occurs when large particles are briefly lifted into air by surface winds, and then soon fall out by sedimentation. On impact with the surface, they may dislodge smaller particles and lift them into the air.  Read and Lewis indicate that the velocity that fine sand (~ 100 μm) would have on impact is only about 50 to 80 cm per second (1.8 to 2.88 kph).²

^{Footnotes for this section:}

¹ Bagnold, R. A. (1954). The Physics of Blown Sand and Desert Dunes. London, Methuen.

² Read, P. L., & Lewis, S. R. (2004). The Martian Climate Revisited, Atmosphere and Environment of a Desert Planet, Chichester, UK: Praxis.

       Balme and Greeley³ state, “The Martian atmosphere is thinner than Earth’s… so much higher wind speeds are required to pick up sand or dust on Mars.  Wind tunnel studies have shown that, like Earth, particles with diameter 80-100 μm (fine sand) are the easiest to move, having the lowest static threshold friction velocity, and that larger and smaller particles require stronger winds to entrain them into the flow.  However, much of Mars’ atmospheric dust load is very small, and the boundary layer wind speeds required to entrain such fine material are in excess of those measured at the surface (Magalhaes et al., 1999).² Nevertheless, fine dust is somehow being injected into the atmosphere to support… haze and … local… and global… dust storms.”

       The problem of dust particle size is more serious than indicated above.  Optimum particle size for direct lifting by the wind (with the lowest threshold velocity) is around 90 μm. This requires a wind at 5 meters altitude to be around 30-40 m/s. For smaller particles like the 1 μm size dust typically suspended in the air over Mars, the threshold velocity is extremely high, requiring enormous wind speeds (>500 m/s) at 5 m altitude which would never occur.  It is thus argued that saltation must be crucial to the lifting of very small particles into the air (Read and Lewis, 2004, 190).³⁴

³ Balme, M., Greeley R. (2006), Dust devils on Earth and Mars, Review Geophysics., 44, RG3003,doi:10.1029/2005RG000188. http://gaspra.la.asu.edu/dustdevil/proceed/Balme_and_Greeley_DD_ms.pdf

⁴ Magalhaes, J.A., Schofield, J.T., & Seiff, A. (1999). Results of the Mars Pathfinder atmospheric structure investigation, J. Physics. Res., 104,  8943-8955

In summary with respect to saltation on Mars, the problem is that the wind speeds do not appear to be great enough to lift the dust if it is only 1 μm. However if bacteria cling to the dust, then the combined particle size will grow. On bacterial cells range from about 1 to 10 microns in length and from 0.2 to 1 micron in width.

 WEATHER AT MSL FOR SOLS SHOWN IN FIGURE 3. On Table 1 column subjects and color codings are as follows:

Column Q shows the Ls during Year 1.

DOES LIFE EXIST ON DUST ON EARTH? Yes. Wikipedia states of dust mites that, "They are generally found on the floor and other surfaces until disturbed (by walking, for example). It could take somewhere between twenty minutes and two hours for dust mites to settle back down out of the air." In fact, at Smithsonian.com we learn that:

 TIMING  OF SPAWNING ON EARTH.  We are interested in whether, if there is microscopic life on Mars, there might be a mass spawing that occurs in conjunction with the rising dust.

       On Earth mass coral spawning is an annual phenomenon that usually occurs over several days to just over a week after a full moon. Depending on location, it happens at different times of year. For example, coral spawning in Curaçao, Netherlands Antilles, normally occurs in September and October. Whereas the same happens at Australia’s Great Barrier Reef in Spring.

MARTIAN DUST STORM SEASONS. For the Martian northern hemisphere Mars seasonal dust storms originate in two seasons, at solar longitude (Ls) 180 to 240° and Ls 305 to 350°. In the southern hemisphere seasonal dust storms usually originate between Ls 135 to 245°. So there is an overlap between Ls 180 to 240°. Length of days in hours at each Ls just mentioned is given in Table 2 below:

       A study published in the Cell Press journal Current Biology on 7 January 2016 confirmed that it is the moon that drives the vertical migrations of tiny marine animals like zooplankton through the dark, frigid Arctic winter. A mass of zooplankton from the surface waters sink to 50m every 29.5 days during winter, which coincides with the full moon, which is likely an attempt to avert predator hunting by moonlight.