Questions tagged [atmosphere]
For questions about the gases which surround a planet or some other celestial body.
11
votes
2answers
1k views
What color should the snow be in this chlorine world?
This question is in the same context (the same world) proposed by Steven L. Gillett in his book: "World-building".
And actually there have been some other questions about this same chlorinated world. ...
8
votes
1answer
96 views
Carbon cycle in a sulphur-based biochemistry
I'm designing a world with advanced life forms that use a sulphur-based biochemistry (see this link for context). I would like to create a carbon cycle analogous to Earth, where:
Photosynthesis ...
5
votes
2answers
108 views
Reducing atmospheric pressure on Snowball Earth
A Snowball Earth is a global condition (which may have occurred many times) in which the temperature everywhere on the surface was, for extended periods (up to tens of millions of years), below the ...
0
votes
2answers
219 views
If a Mount Everest-sized mountain had Earth's sea level atmospheric pressure at the top, what would the atmospheric pressure be at sea level?
I'm designing a world with earthlike gravity where the human colonists are intended to live on top of a gigantic shield volcano as tall as Mount Everest. What would the pressure be at the bottom? ...
6
votes
1answer
51 views
Seasonal pressure areas over continents located in both northern and southern hemispheres
On a real world Earth, the seasonal changes in temperature of continents create high-pressure areas during winter in that hemisphere, and low-pressure areas during summer in that hemisphere.
Should ...
6
votes
1answer
168 views
Possible sky colors compatible with life on earth
This question has been asked in similar forms on this site already with some good answers like here:
What Color Can the Sky Be?
How could the sky be orange in a breathable atmosphere?
What would ...
6
votes
5answers
595 views
If Earth's atmosphere were to be enclosed, what effects would what have?
A universe-destroying parasite is set loose, and basically earth is placed under magical quarantine. (Think of it like the world is wrapped in magical cellophane.) My question is, how would earth's ...
7
votes
2answers
130 views
Calculating an eccentric enough orbit to allow a dip into atmosphere and escape again
How would I calculate if it is possible to have an eccentric enough orbit around a gas giant to dip the periapsis some depth(how deep?) into the atmosphere of a gas giant like Jupiter or Saturn and ...
6
votes
3answers
124 views
Forging with geothermal heat: Possible alternative to fire in alien species' technological progression?
A world idea I'm playing with for a sci-fi idea I'm working on has an atmosphere similar to the composition of Earth's atmosphere during the Carboniferous Period: Lots of oxygen, so while a human or a ...
0
votes
2answers
80 views
Effects of long term exposure to a non-earth like rich atmosphere
Imagine that humanity found a rocky planet with earth like gravity, atmospheric pressure, and temperature, orbiting a sun-like star. The only problem is that the planets atmosphere is that it is ...
3
votes
4answers
126 views
Underground Atmosphere
I have a terrestrial planet that is similar to Mars in many ways, a desert-like surface, thin atmosphere, and inhospitable to large flora and fauna as we know it.
This planet has ceased tectonic ...
6
votes
1answer
187 views
What would be the atmospheric pressure gradient in an open pit reaching to the centre of the moon?
Inspired by this question, what would the pressure stabilize at over tens of thousands of years (at the moon's centre, surface, and any other interesting points) if you created a structurally stable ...
29
votes
5answers
6k views
How deep must be a pit on the moon to hold atmosphere at 1ATM on the bottom
In my world I would like to create a pit on the Moon filled with air.
How deep would the pit need to be to get 1 ATM of pressure
Could the pit maintain the air or would it be lost to space?
If it ...
7
votes
4answers
559 views
Putting oxygen on the Moon - the easy way
It would be nice if there were an atmosphere on the Moon with oxygen; in fact it could be just oxygen at 1/5 the Earth's pressure. People could live there. Now of course given the Moon's lower gravity ...
5
votes
2answers
308 views
Which unique features should have a habitable planet originating from atmosphere stripped waterworld?
Premises:
red dwarfs tend to have violent sun storms in their early years, thus are expected to strip atmosphere of planets that may be in their habitable zones;
water worlds (including planets with ...
6
votes
1answer
100 views
What are materials that could give an atmosphere a deep blue color?
Here's some rough WIP pixel art of the planet I'm trying to create just to give you an idea of what I'm talking about color wise. I'm referencing the dark blue that you see at the poles of the planet.
...
5
votes
1answer
111 views
Is a planetary 'temperature inversion' plausible?
It was disputed in the 1940s-50s whether Venus
had a hot surface and cool cloud layer or
a cool surface and hot cloud layer.
As I recall, both were considered at the limits of plausibility at the ...
6
votes
3answers
153 views
How to have people and big bugs at the same time
There's been a few questions about making big bugs before and the consensus in they can't get much bigger than 3ft or so (which in reality is still huge). Catch is, you need quite a bit of extra ...
9
votes
5answers
927 views
What would make radio transmission unfeasible on a planet?
I am looking for a good reason to make radio communications on a planetary scale unfeasible or impossible. Short-range use is acceptable, but no transmissions should make it to orbit or over the ...
12
votes
5answers
2k views
50% O₂ 25% Neon 23% Nitrogen and 3% trace gasses?
Could an atmosphere of 50% O₂ 25% Neon 23% Nitrogen and 3% trace gasses be survivable for a human being at the similar or slightly less atmospheric pressures as Earth?
5
votes
5answers
2k views
What natural event could strip all of Earth atmosphere?
I was reading up on Mars thin atmosphere and was wondering how could Earth becomes like the red planet except it only has only 100 pascal (air pressure) at imaginary sea level? Mars is 600 pascal on ...
3
votes
3answers
134 views
What Muscles in the Human Body Could Produce a Flight Stroke?
I have an idea for a story where humans on a low g planet with a dense atmosphere wear artificial wings to fly. I know that muscles they would use to produce a flight stroke would be in the upper body,...
6
votes
6answers
437 views
Greenhouse Planet Terraforming - Will a balloon jacket self-stabilise?
Most of what follows is scientifically dubious. I'm looking to clarify one aspect and one aspect alone.
A small planet is being terraformed by an alien race who have been doing this for millennia. ...
2
votes
2answers
101 views
Human Shoulder Motion & Powered Flight
I have an idea for a story where human live on world with low gravity and a dense atmosphere. These humans have developed artificial wings that are attached to their arms so they can fly. Since the ...
12
votes
2answers
307 views
How to predict the color of this sky?
How can I predict the color of the sky based on the information provided?
Atmospheric composition:
| 2% Trace gases | 58% Nitrogen | 26% Oxygen | 11% Argon | 3% Carbon dioxide |
Average ...
0
votes
3answers
167 views
What amount of heat would be necessary to evaporate the oceans? Can his heat threshold be reached if there were no ozone layer? [closed]
The problem in my fictional future Earth was: almost the entire ozone layer disappeared due to a massive release of CFCs in the atmosphere. I was trying to calculate if this would lead to the oceans ...
5
votes
3answers
194 views
Airships in a world with 1/3 gravity but 3 times the mass of atmosphere?
In the first question I posted here on Worldbuilding Stack Exchange, I asked if lifting gas would be more effective on a world with 1/3 of Earths gravity but with the same atmospheric composition as ...
5
votes
2answers
251 views
How far can a human see?
I'm asking this question as a reference for use in worldbuilding when developing world size, atmospheric content, or alien optometric abilities (aka, vision).
While I'm specifically asking two ...
3
votes
2answers
125 views
Would an atmosphere of supercritical CO2 affect available light?
Many of you may have heard that supercritical CO2 (as in at just the right temperature and pressure to be in between gas and liquid) is a possible alternative solvent for life, like water is for us. ...
1
vote
2answers
111 views
Atmosphere density and visibility range [duplicate]
How far can you see through an atmosphere like the one we have on Earth?
The protagonist inhabits a huge world, like the inside of a sphere, a Dyson-sphere, with an approximate circumference defined ...
12
votes
2answers
1k views
How much hydrogen and oxygen can I add to an atmosphere before it explodes?
Hydrogen and oxygen gases can be combined to form water and a lot of heat. As with many exothermic reactions, the heat from this process can provide activation energy to the reaction of more H2 with ...
1
vote
1answer
86 views
Is this planet's sulphur dioxide atmosphere feasible?
My planet is highly volcanic, as such the atmosphere is filled with gases put off by the volcanoes:
Like Earth Nitrogen also makes up most of Marhdii’s atmosphere at 43%. Also like Earth, Nitrogen ...
5
votes
1answer
108 views
Colonies in giant caves
My colonizing business found a small planet with about 0.8G. They would like to build the colony in the giant caves under the crust of the planet, due to the conditions of the surface,(little ...
-1
votes
3answers
95 views
Floating cities [closed]
Floating city in the atmosphere of a gas giant.
In this Scenario; My colonizing business finds a gas giant in the goldilocks zone. Some of the crazy engineers want to build floating cities in the ...
5
votes
6answers
1k views
How could someone ground a breathable synthetic atmosphere onto a small asteroid?
Let's say there are billions of asteroids in the galaxy, varying in size from baseballs to hunks of rock almost big enough to be dwarf planets. If someone wanted to set up a habitable location on one ...
16
votes
2answers
2k views
Argon Environment Spelunking
Monster Slayer Stan, we are in dire need of your help! The caves in our nearby mountain are filling up with a dense but non-toxic gas that is protecting a monster's nest. The monsters are weak but are ...
6
votes
6answers
393 views
Producing oxygen without plants
Obviously, current oxygen levels should last us years, so we are talking about a long-term solution.
Also, in this hypothetical scenario, plants have stopped releasing oxygen but haven't stop ...
5
votes
2answers
167 views
Which hydrogen halide to have in blood to replace water?
So I want to have an alien creature on a planet with a halogen atmosphere. It will have to be at a temperature where the hydrogen halide is liquid or solid.
This hydrogen halide I would have as the ...
6
votes
1answer
123 views
Making Titan's atmosphere transparent
I'm interested in what kind of events / processes would it take to make Titan's atmosphere more or less transparent.
The year is around 2150. The technology has progressed, sure, but it's nowhere ...
5
votes
2answers
203 views
Is it possible for an atmosphere to have gasoline mixed in it?
Is there such a thing as gasoline vapors, or some kind of gas that can be given off by gasoline? I'm trying to come up with a planet where the atmosphere is combustible and constantly catching on fire ...
4
votes
3answers
362 views
Designing a mega-fog
Considering some of the answers given in a previous question, I would like to ask what climatic phenomenon would be necessary to generate a mega-fog, thick enough to at least reduce the intensity of ...
20
votes
5answers
5k views
A very small part of an office building is gone, leaving vacuum. How does this affect its surroundings?
A small perfect sphere is suddenly gone. Everything inside is teleported somewhere -- through space or even maybe through time, we're not sure. It's a small sphere, just enough to fit a human sitting ...
4
votes
1answer
121 views
How can the Progenitors oxygenate a world?
The Progenitors are an ancient race of almost infinite technological sophisitication, who mysteriously vanished millions of years ago for no good reason (I don't like TV Tropes, but you are welcome to ...
-1
votes
2answers
112 views
Earth-like planet which is smaller but has the same gravity
If there were a planet similar to earth where the lines of latitude and longitude were half as far apart (about 35 miles instead of about 70), but the planet's density were increased to compensate for ...
20
votes
6answers
5k views
An iron rain to starve a planet
I have a generic Earth like planet, same atmospheric composition, and the same oceanic composition. The crust of this planet is predominantly silicon based but plenty of iron, nickel and copper. ...
2
votes
2answers
111 views
Necessary atmospheric conditions for humans to survive on other planets [closed]
So my question is about what the acceptable envelop of a planet's atmosphere would need to have to enable humans to live there.
As we all know, earth is comprised of a mix of 21% Oxygen, 78% ...
3
votes
1answer
53 views
High-atmosphere wind dangers on a rocky planet
What would be a good way to explain dangerous winds on a rocky planet like mars? I'm looking to create a dangerous situation for atmospheric pilots trying to land, specifically for sudden changes in ...
2
votes
4answers
216 views
Clouds on a planet surrounded by a giant “meridian” wall
I am writing a fan-fiction (thus the world that my story is set in is not mine though some modifications can be done in accordance to my story's timeline and setting in relation to the canon universe) ...
0
votes
1answer
70 views
Planet-sized creatures floating in breathable system-wide atmosphere
In the future, we created a Dyson Swarm.
Each node (which I'd like to call a Gigalga) is an asteroid-sized, biotechnological, space-adapted, sentient plant that speaks the same evolved language as we ...
12
votes
4answers
564 views
Prevailing winds on a rotating space habitat
A common, matter-efficient science-fiction habitat is a hollow cylinder or ring in space that is spun to simulate the pull of gravity on its interior surface. These habitats have been imagined as ...
