Employees of the Blue Marble Space Institute of Science have announced that Mars has lost its atmosphere due to the impact of solar wind, writes Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.
According to astrophysicists, they studied the data obtained earlier by the MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN Mission) apparatus. It turned out that charged particles emanating from the Sun can "extract" hydrogen molecules from the atmosphere of Mars.
Ionized radiation, experts say, is one of the main reasons for the disappearance of the Martian atmosphere. Rotating around the Sun, falling into dense clouds of gas and dust, Mars gradually lost its atmosphere. The atmosphere of this planet was destroyed in about 1 million years.
About 135 times, Mars fell into dense streams of the solar wind, which created a powerful shock wave along with the gas and dust contained in the interstellar cloud. At a time, the Red Planet could lose up to 0.5% of its atmosphere.