Nuclear explosion on Mars

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

On Earth, in Africa in the Oklo region, on the territory of present-day Gabon, a natural nuclear reactor operated about 1 billion years ago, in which groundwater interacted with a uranium deposit. This reactor was self-regulating - water played the role of a coolant and moderator of the neutron flux in it, preventing the reaction from crossing the critical threshold. This natural reactor worked for several million years, producing plutonium.

Brandenburg notes that both components of a natural nuclear power plant are present on Mars - groundwater and uranium reserves.

"There is evidence that a large nuclear reactor formed and operated on Mars in the northern Acidalian Sea (in the planet's western hemisphere). However, unlike terrestrial counterparts, this natural reactor was apparently much larger, producing uranium-233 from thorium, and, apparently, collapsed as a result of the explosion, releasing a significant amount of radioactive substances on the surface of Mars, "- said in a report by Brandenburg at a planetary conference in the United States.

According to the scientist, an ore body consisting of concentrated uranium, thorium and potassium existed in the Acidalian Sea on Mars about a billion years ago at a depth of about a kilometer. Due to the fact that on Mars, unlike Earth, there is no tectonic plate movement, the ore body remained intact, and a nuclear reaction with the release of heat was maintained in it. This process began about a billion years ago, when the share of uranium-235 in the deposit was 3%, and could be triggered by the penetration of underground water into the ore body.

Several hundred million years later, the reactor began producing nuclear fuel in the form of uranium-233 and plutonium-239 faster than burning it. The strong flux of neutrons also led to the formation of a large number of radioactive potassium isotopes.

At some point, the reactor went into a critical mode - the water boiled away, which led to an increase in the neutron flux and the start of a spontaneous chain reaction with the participation of uranium-233 and plutonium-239.

Due to the large size of the ore body itself and its position at a depth of about 1 kilometer, the reaction continued without explosive destruction up to sufficiently high burnup rates.

"The release of energy was catastrophic and caused a cloud of dust and ash to be emitted as from a powerful asteroid impact. This caused radioactive dust and debris to fall out over a large part of the planet's surface, and this layer was enriched in uranium and thorium. The explosion formed a depression wide about 400 kilometers in the Acidalian Sea region, "the report says.

According to the calculations of Brandenburg, the energy of the explosion was equivalent to the energy from falling on the surface of a 30-kilometer asteroid. However, in contrast to the asteroid impact, the explosion source was closer to the surface, and the depression formed by it was significantly shallower than the impact craters.

Features of the planet

The region with a high concentration of thorium is located in the northwest of the Acidalian Sea in a wide and shallow depression. The content of traces of thorium and radioactive isotopes of potassium indicates that a nuclear catastrophe occurred several hundred million years ago, in the middle or end of the Amazonian era. This catastrophe is also indicated by the presence of gases resulting from nuclear reactions - argon-40 and xenon-129 - in the planet's atmosphere.

"The existence of such a large natural nuclear reactor could explain some of the mysterious features in the Martian data, such asas an increased content of potassium and thorium on the surface and a large set of radiogenic isotopes in the atmosphere, "the scientist notes.

Doubt hypothesis

Other researchers express doubts about the reality of the catastrophe described by Brandenburg.

For example, Dr. David Beaty of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory notes that the current geological conditions on both Mars and Earth have existed for millennia and have experienced few abrupt changes.

"Rocks are stones. (Natural nuclear reaction) could happen in a billion years, but this is not a reason right now to run home to your family and run into the mountains," - said Beaty, quoted by Fox News.

Lars Borg, a scientist at Livermore National Laboratory, said the features Brandenburg is pointing to may be related to "normal" geological processes rather than nuclear reactions.

“We have been studying Martian meteorites for 15 years and know their isotopic composition in detail. However, there is no one who thinks about the possibility of a natural nuclear explosion on Mars,” says Borg.