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[–]fred_red_beans[S] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (5 children)

“However, on Mars, whatever process disturbed the … isotopes made the lighter isotopes relatively more abundant than heavier ones. This requires a predominantly nuclear process rather than mass fractionation,” he wrote.

If the explosions were natural, we would see large craters in the surface of Mars, said Brandenburg. He suggests instead that the explosions occurred due to large airborne fusion-fission devices of similar design to those seen on Earth.

So nova near our star system where mars is exposed, while earth is behind the sun, or due to Mars' lack of atmosphere may be just as plausible or fit this hypothesis. I'm no nuclear scientist myself so....

[–]Tom_Bombadil 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

Could coronal mass ejections hitting a planet with no magnetosphere cause a similar result? IDK?

Martain space nukes is the worst theory ever.

[–]JasonCarswell 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

It'd have to be a direct hit, if it can even do an intense enough blast.

[–]Tom_Bombadil 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

There is an asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. The asteroid belt is probably the remainder of a planet/planetoid that was wrecked by a massive impact and/or tidal forces with Jupiter (and the... sun..?).

My guy theory is that a massive primordial comet/planetoid collided, and shattered that planet's metal-crystalline core, which was comprised of dense materials (nickel/iron/thorium, etc.) .

Mars would be impacted by a significant amount of the former planets material on the martain surface. This material would be expected to remain in relative place, if there wasn't a significant contributor to soil erosion (wind, water, ocean, atmosphere.

This could potentially produce higher than terrestrially expected material concentrations. For example: heavy/radioactive metals, xenon gas, etc.

Xenon is an inert gas, and very dense (atomic weight of 131, Xe2 = 262 g molar weight. Compare to N2 @ 28 g molar weight.. Solar wind may knock other lighter molecules out of Mars' atmosphere. This could produce higher than expected quantities of this element.

My shot-from-the-hip attempt at a reasonably plausible theory.

[–]JasonCarswell 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I don't buy the tidal forces bit.

But I do buy the planet(oid) bit. They say Earth was hit by a smaller planet(oid) and much of the heavy content fell back to what remained of the earth and the earth had a ring for a while that formed the moon, lighter than one would expect and without a strong magnetic field.

Our moon is drifting away. Eventually it will slip the bonds of earth. And then what?

All the planets are slowly moving in one direction or another, sometimes changing due to alignments. Sometimes colliding or enveloping (Jupiter). They say the Earth is only 4.5 billion years old and the Universe 13.7. That's a lot of drift time.

Maybe Mars was similarly a resultant "moon" of that shattered planet, also with a weak core.

Add my theory to yours and I think we've got a Nobel Prize in theoretical armchair slackery.

[–]JasonCarswell 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

While the sun is huge I don't think going "behind" the sun adds up to much as the distances are so vast.