Observed variations of methane on Mars unexplained by known atmospheric chemistry and physics

Franck Lefèvre () and François Forget
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Franck Lefèvre: LATMOS,
François Forget: Laboratoire de Météorologie Dynamique, UPMC Université Paris 06, CNRS, Paris 75005, France

Nature, 2009, vol. 460, issue 7256, 720-723

Abstract: Methane making on Mars Recent observations of methane on Mars suggest that methane concentrations are locally enhanced and change with season. Methane has a photochemical lifetime of several centuries, however, and it is therefore expected to have a spatially uniform distribution on the planet. Frank Lefèvre and François Forget use a global climate model of Mars with coupled chemistry to examine the implications of the recently observed variations of Martian methane for our understanding of the chemistry of methane. They find that photochemistry as currently understood does not produce measurable variations in methane concentrations and that the destruction of methane on the surface of Mars would have to be extraordinarily fast to explain the reported observations. We may need to wait for future Mars probes to make in situ measurements to discover exactly what is happening to Martian methane.

Date: 2009
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DOI: 10.1038/nature08228

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