How the UAE is sending a spacecraft to Mars – the first attempt

Gaining more knowledge about the Martian climate may help us study long-term weather patterns on Earth, including what climate change might mean in the long run.

“Mars underwent a major transition billions of years ago,” Al Matroushi said. “It’s important to understand how the Mars of the past became the Mars of the present. Because we want to understand what happened to our planet, because there are some similarities between us. I wouldn’t say we are exactly the same—for example, we do There’s a strong magnetic field that protects us from the sun, Mars doesn’t. It doesn’t have the protection that we do. So that might help why there’s such a drastic change.”

Hope’s primary mission to Mars is the last Martian year, equivalent to two Earth years. But Al Matroushi’s science team is already looking further afield. “During the year we’re making observations, the sun isn’t active — we’re not at the top of the solar cycle.” This could change if the mission is extended, leading to some very different observations. “Now we’re seeing a lot of Sun activity up. How does that impact [Mars’] atmosphere? “

Knowing this will give the UAE team a deeper look into the past. “Because trying to understand how this kind of activity affects the Martian atmosphere in terms of climate, dust storms, etc., can give us some guidance as to what happened, or contributed to those changes that we have seen in the past. We can draw some implications for us here on Earth. Helpful insights too.”

The weather wasn’t the only discovery. In August 2022, Hope sent back the first “Patchwork auroras in the upper atmosphere of Mars, suggesting a chaotic junction between Earth’s atmosphere and the solar wind. Scientists had previously expected Martian auroras to be relatively uniform.

Hope’s mission will continue until February next year, and everything is going according to plan. Al Matroushi is already anticipating what it might find in the coming months. “No Mars year will be the same,” she said. For example, this year has been a light year for dust storms — while some regional storms have raged, there have been no truly global storms yet. “I can only imagine if we could watch a storm sweep across the planet.” Even on Zoom, the excitement in her voice was palpable. “It’s really exciting. There’s a lot of science to unravel.”

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