Science Forums 2

[Eclipse Now]

OK here's an out there left of field idea for our nano-engineers to consider in their sci-fi brainstorming sessions.... (for nano-tech 50 years down the track).

If radiation is the problem, and atmosphere is the solution, then let's wrap the planet in glad wrap! Think it through with me...

With nano-materials evolving the way it is, what about some kind of super-light sticky nano-glue that both floated on air AND yet somehow formed a barrier for the atmosphere? it would have to be self-healing after the thousands of micro-meteorite strikes each day, so I'm imagining something that is semi-permeable but thick enough to stop ALL the atmosphere constantly being teased away as fast by the solar rays? Would such a thing be **possible** with nano-tech down the track? How would it be suspended, giant air-balloons & carbon nano-tube strings? How would it self heal? Would it be semi-organic and the balloons contain some growth medium that reacts with sunlight? Would this artificial "skin" to the atmosphere be lower than a normal Mars atmosphere would have been, enabling more air pressure with less atmospheric mass, also making the job of creating all that atmosphere less arduous?

D'oh! How will rockets launch? They'll tear a hole in this stuff... but then it re-heals? High flying planes might not be able to fly so high?

Of course, the same stuff would probably have been used in Martian air-tent colonies and agricultural zones down at the surface level, especially if this new super material had some radiation deflecting properties we've not yet imagined. Just dreaming.... but flight and microwave ovens were once dreams as well.

Someone had to bake the first Pizza. Who would have guessed that it would soon become the backbone of Western civilisation? (I'm on a diet... nearly every conversation leads to food.)