Thread: Life on other planets

I have an idea that might support our life on other planets such as mars or mabey even the Moon. My idea Make a cycle that repeats its self. You have to make a dome and then plant trees in the dome After awhile you won't need oxygen due to the face that the trees are making oxygen. You would need to have some type of animal life that can convert the oxygen into carbon dioxide again. Some flaws in the plan that I can see is that you would need to be able to wait a long time and have enough Oxygen to have life and to make Carbondixoide. Also this process would take a long time And a lot of work. Another thing that I see that could be a Problem Is the fact that you would need to have some sort of water. You would need hydrogen and oxygen. Its is said on mars that they have found ice on the planet so this idea could still work.

If this were to work each dome so to say would have its own living ecosystem.

Please Reply and say any more flaws in this idea

google "biodome"

I don't see how this helps me because of the fact It comes up with a movie unless the movie is what you wanted me to look up the movie BUT i didnt read the movie because i dont thnk that was what you wanted me to look at.

It's been thought of before. They did have lots of problems with it. See here.
Biosphere 2 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Originally Posted by 17miwoosencraft

I have an idea that might support our life on other planets such as mars or mabey even the Moon. My idea Make a cycle that repeats its self. You have to make a dome and then plant trees in the dome After awhile you won't need oxygen due to the face that the trees are making oxygen. You would need to have some type of animal life that can convert the oxygen into carbon dioxide again. Some flaws in the plan that I can see is that you would need to be able to wait a long time and have enough Oxygen to have life and to make Carbondixoide. Also this process would take a long time And a lot of work. Another thing that I see that could be a Problem Is the fact that you would need to have some sort of water. You would need hydrogen and oxygen. Its is said on mars that they have found ice on the planet so this idea could still work.

If this were to work each dome so to say would have its own living ecosystem.

Please Reply and say any more flaws in this idea

You actually are on the right track and I hope you will pursue this in greater detail. Since you did ask for responses about 'flaws' I hope you will find the following useful: 1) Don't start with trees. Start with algae in water containing nutrient minerals. With a enough light, they will be very fast-growing and are able to convert CO2 to O2. 2) As algae dies, it is harvested as fertilizing bio-mass to create true soil - soil you could grow things in. You are then ready to plant moss, grasses, ferns and other fast-growing plants. Even flowers and certain vegetables! As these die, they too enrich and thicken the soil. You need at least a meter deep of soil to plant most bushes. 3) At this point you plant trees. The first trees should be smaller size working up to larger as you develop more soil and thicken your soil base. You might find this difficult to believe, but it only takes days to grow algae and it keeps growing. Its practically unstoppable. More complex plants take longer, but within a year you might be able to plant bushes. It depends on what you start with for a soil base. . . More generally, if this is for a Mars colony you are going to have a major challenge on your hands. All that sand out there is virtually useless as growing soil. It is mostly iron-rich silicate and way too fine-grained for good water flow to plant roots. You will have to find soil that is more like beach sand. That is possible on Mars, but it will take some doing. . . I would be happy to follow up on any questions you have!

Thanks I will keep this in mind. This is very helpful. I would have never thought of this. Thanks so much.

But if anyone else has an idea that could be added or any other flaws that you see, still be free to leave it in a reply

Sealeaf's intend was not to direct you to the movie... but his intend was for you to look up the term Biodome.

He only said look up Biodome... because it is not an original idea. Indeed when you go to another planet and wish to have an environment able to sustain human lifeforms,... you would need to have a construction like that. The movie Biodome is a very bad written comedy,... but it does show what a Biodome is atleast. There have been, and probably still are, several Biodomes around the world, for researching this concept.

To extend on Moonguys post,...

If you want a Biodome on ... lets say ... Mars... You may run into some troubling factors. Mars does not have a protective magnetic field as the Earth has, which make Mars highly volitile to Radiation Bombardements from our Sun.

Yes, Mars is further from our Sun,... but for a Bio-dome principle to work on Mars,.. the human living quarters would need to be below ground beneath enough rock layers for the humans to survive. If not,.. they will get their DNA scambled and eventually die of cancers.
Besides the humans,... all life you wish to introduce on Mars, would need to be able to resist such Radiation, if they can not be moved in case the Sun desides to spew out some radiation towards Mars.

Me again. . . I forgot to mention that when you have algae growing in the water you want to introduce algae-eating fish and crustaceans. These are another food source. Stingless bees are important for the growth cycle of plants because they pollinate flowers and their honey is probably one of the best foods you can have if you are limited in growing capacity. Estheria's comments are right on. You really cannot risk using a clear dome like many suggest. Go with an 'underground' construction covered by several meters of dried regolith. 3 to 5 should do it, if its Mars you are after. This is fun. I'm sure I'll think of something more later.

Guys Is okay if i use your guyes help in a paper and and future items???/ If you dont say anything I will assume you don't care due to the fact that you are not active to this forum.

if you dont want what you said in the form to go out from my words so to say please leave a comment about it

Originally Posted by 17miwoosencraft

Guys Is okay if i use your guyes help in a paper and and future items???/ If you dont say anything I will assume you don't care due to the fact that you are not active to this forum.

With the exception of "simply posting a homework question and expecting others to do all the work", you are free to post any questions you have.

Different questions will interest different people (or maybe no-one).
So it's probably best to just post your question (start a new thread) and see what responses you get.

Proper sequencing is everything. You want an environment that is as totally self-sustaining as possible. There will always be some need for human support of some kind. Think of that as employment security. So. . . Do not try to put birds in the environment before you have insects they can eat. The problem there is the dome would be a natural breeding ground for just about any insect I know and they might overwhelm the place. Hummingbirds, however, eat nectar and are real pleasant to have around. They will likely leave the honey bees alone too. . . As a rule, you develop from smaller to larger. Bacteria in organic compost are the best example. Algae in the water is another. The soil should have earthworms (I understand there bird species that eat these exclusively), but you need bacteria to break down organic matter so the earthworms can digest it. . . See how this works? The interconnectivity of it all? Before all of this, you have to get clear about how you expect to provide light, warmth, humidity, precipitation and whether you will vary these things over the course of a year - thsat is, have seasons - because those choices will, directly impact what plants you should use.

Hence the importance of biosphere type projects, we really need to be sure we can do this reliably before we send people to another rock to try it there. We ought to have practicly down to a kit form: 1) inflate tent, 2) open bio kit, 3) add water, 4) plug in lights 5) step back and let it grow, 6)harvest shrimp, clams and veggies.

Originally Posted by Sealeaf

Hence the importance of biosphere type projects, we really need to be sure we can do this reliably before we send people to another rock to try it there. We ought to have practicly down to a kit form: 1) inflate tent, 2) open bio kit, 3) add water, 4) plug in lights 5) step back and let it grow, 6)harvest shrimp, clams and veggies.

I think the original poster has the same opinion. Its a good thing we have the Moon to try this out on. Earth is just a few days away, just in case. . .