IT’S ONE of the central mysteries of the Solar System: why does a sizeable
planet like Mars not have an atmosphere that could nurture and sustain life?
That question may now have been answered. Scientists working with NASA’s Mars
Global Surveyor say the planet’s atmosphere was blown away by the solar wind,
following the demise of its magnetic field four billion years ago. This happened
so soon after Mars’s formation that it is unlikely complex life would have had
time to evolve.
Every planet in the Solar System is buffeted by the solar wind, a stream of
charged particles flowing…
