by Kathleen Romero

• Name• Size• Location• Atmosphere• Climate • Surface• Satellites (Moons)• Movement• Key Explorations• Life on Mars?• Works Cited

Name

• Mars was named after the Roman god of war and agriculture (Aries in Greek mythology).

• The planet probably got this name due to its fiery red color, caused by the high amount of iron oxide in its soil. It is sometimes referred to as the Red Planet.

• The name of the month March derives from Mars.

Name

• Mars was named after the Roman god of war and agriculture (Aries in Greek mythology).

• The planet probably got this name due to its firey red color, caused by the high amount of iron oxide in its soil. It is sometimes referred to as the Red Planet.

• The name of the month March derives from Mars.

•Mars is a relatively small planet, with about half the diameter of Earth and

about one-tenth Earth's mass. surface area is about the same as the land surface area of Earth. The

diameter of Mars is 14.5 million miles.

mass: 6.4219e23

Location

•Mars is located 143 million miles from the sun, making it the forth planet from the sun.

•Since Mars is found inside the asteroid belt, it is termed an Inner Planet (or Terrestrial Planet). Mercury, Venus, and Earth are also considered Inner Planets.

• Characterized by dramatic weather changes. Since Mars has a thin atmoshere and no oceans to store heat, temperatures quikly change. Mars has seasons, polar caps, clouds, sand dunes, and dust devils, but no running water.Dust storms are also common and sometimes smother the entire planet!The average temperature on Mars is about -67 F!

•Mars has a very thin atmosphere composed of: carbon dioxide (95.3%) nitrogen (2.7%), argon (1.6%) oxygen (0.15%) water (0.03%)

• Much of Mar’s surface is very old and cratered, but there are also much younger rift valleys, ridges, hills and

plains. The dust is not sandy, as in a sandstorm on Earth, but has the consistency of flour. The most interesting surface features of Mars include two very distinct hemispheres, an enormous bulge called Tharsis littered with volcanoes and cut by an enormous rift valley, channels apparently carved by water, and polar ice caps similar to Earth's.

it is more like the surface of Earth than that of any other planet.

Mars has two moons that orbit

around it. Named after the

horses that pulled Ares

chariot, these moons were

probably once asteroids that got captured in the

Martian magnetic field.

PhobosMeans “Fear”

Phobos

Means “Panic”

Movement

• Martian orbit: 14.5 miles per second 227,940,000 km (1.52 AU) from Sun

• Length of Martian year: 687 Earth days.

• Length of Martian day: 24 hours and 37 minutes.

Key ExplorationsMariner 4

Reached Mars in 1965 and took the first close-up images of the Martian surface (22 in all) as it flew by the planet. The probe found a cratered

world with an atmosphere much thinner than previously thought.

Mariner 9 In 1971, became the first craft to orbit Mars. It returned information

on the Red Planet that no other probe had done before, revealing

huge volcanoes on the Martian surface, as well as giant canyon

systems, and evidence that water once flowed across the planet. The probe also took the first detailed

close up images of Mars' two small moons.

•Life on Mars?

• Mars has been a favorite of people’s imaginations--especially science fiction writers-- as the most likely planet in our solar system (other than Earth) for human habitation.

• The 1938 radio show “War of the Worlds” spread histeria through the nation, convincing listeners that aliens landing in spaceships were attacking Earth.

•Life on Mars?

• In 1976 the Viking Orbiter 1 took pictures of an ususual rock formation.

• Many people at the time believed that it resembled a face, therefore proving Mars had once been inhabited!

• Scientists, on the other hand, believe that the “face” is merely a coincedence--a combination of rock formation and erosion.

• What do you think?

•Life on Mars?

• Although many scientists claim that Earth is the only planet that has ever had life, some claim that Martian meterorites hold fossils and bacteria indicating otherwise.

• In either case, it appears unlikly that Mars has ever been home to little green men.

•Works CitedImages

Star Background and GalaxyFree Backgrounds http://www.freebackgrounds.com

Mars Digital Image Model, Astronaut, NSSDC Photo Gallery http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/photo_gallery/photogallery-mars.html

AresTom’s Zena Page http://www.xenafan.com/

Mars Compared to Earth and Planet SequenceScience Monster http://www.sciencemonster.com/planets.html

Explorers on Mars SurfaceScience@NASA http://www.science.nasa.gov/headlines/images/marie/humans_med.jpg

Mars AtmosphereSpaceKids@Space.com www.spacekids.com/images/ k_h_mars_atmosphere_02.jpg

Mars Moons, Mars Surface, and FaceThe Nine Planets http://www.angelfire.com/ak/2science/

Martian MeteoriteNASA Mars Exploration http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/life/index.html

War of the Worlds PosterMovie Props www.movieprop.com/tvandmovie/ reviews/waroftheworlds.jpg

New York Times NewspaperBerger, Marilyn. "John Houseman Dies." New York Times Online. 1 Nov. 1988. 29 Oct. 2001 http://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/bday/0922.html.

Orson Wells PhotoOrson Wells and the Mercury Theater Group students.goucher.edu/.../ Orson%20wells%20broadcast%202.jpg