False-color image of channel-confined TARs in the Amenthes Rupes Region, Mars (NASA/JPL/University of Arizona)

On our own world, dust storms can carry sands from the Sahara around the globe.On Mars, immense dust storms worthy of a Mad Max reference and formations called Transverse Aeolian Ridges up to a meter tall are common sights. Unlike Earth, where we constantly see geoactive forces like water, ice, and volcanic activity changing the landscape around us, the only force we can see actively changing the landscape of Mars is the wind. With desertification increasing on our own planet dune fields in many locations are moving into existing agricultural areas. Might we eventually be living on a world where the impact of wind on the land is as great as it is on Mars? Can the windswept world of Mars tell us what life will be like someday here on Earth?

Gravel ripple wind-formed bedforms in Puna de Atacama, Argentina (de Silva et al., 2013)

Rover image of Transverse Aeolian Ridges (TARs) in Endurance Crater, Mars (NASA/JPL/University of Arizona)

Michelle Neely, a master’s student in Geology and Geophysics studying under Shan de Silva, is investigating just that. By studying wind shaped formations called symetrical bed forms in the high desert of Argentina, which are the Earth’s closest analog to the ridges formed by the winds of Mars, Michelle hopes to learn how wind processes work on both worlds. If terrestrial desertification leaves our Blue Planet looking a lot more like the Red Planet, this research will prove invaluable.

For more on the geological history of Mars and our own future, tune in to 88.7 FM Sunday November 8th at 7pm PST or stream live to find out!

Tonight at 7 pm Pacific time Nilo Bill joins the hosts of Inspiration Dissemination to discuss his research in the Geology Program of the College of Earth Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences. Tune in to 88.7 FM KBVR Corvallis, or stream the show live, here!

Working underneath Peter U. Clark, Nilo studies paleoclimate, the ancient climate of the Earth. By examining erratic boulders in the West Antarctic Ice Sheet moved by glacial decay between 10 and 20 thousand years ago Nilo tries to understand when and why the Antarctic ice sheets began to recede. For example: How much of this change can be attributed to CO2 increases in the atmosphere?  When the sea levels rose after the last ice age, what glaciers did most of the water come from?

The West Antarctic Ice Sheet. Image from: http://learningfromdogs.com/tag/west-antarctic-ice-sheet/

Nilo became interested in the question of ancient climate and sea level rise far from Oregon State or any ice sheets, in the geomicrobiology lab at University of Miami, where he studied coral reefs to learn how much water levels rose 10 to 20 thousand years ago during the last large scale glacial melt.

Nilo’s work on ancient climate allows us not only to better understand the history of the world, but also where we are headed, as we continue to contribute to increasing atmospheric CO2 levels. Increases in atmospheric CO2 that have been linked to global climate changes and glacial melt in the past are being seen again in our own time, but at much faster rates. Whereas in the past these changes occurred over a span of nine to ten thousand years, humans have artificially increased global CO2 by comparative levels in only one hundred years.

By understanding how the earth has behaved under similar circumstances in the past, Nilo hopes that we might better predict what will occur in our own future.