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June 11th, 2025
Terraforming Mars would require warming the atmosphere to enable engineered microbes to create oxygen through photosynthesis, which would further allow for slow oxygen build-up to support liquid water and more complex life.
Image credit: Los Alamos National Laboratory
Transforming Mars to make the Red Planet more palatable for we humans is called terraforming.
But what needs to be done now if there’s intent to overhaul that world to make it more Earth-like? Also, is there science to support such a reconstruction effort?
A research group led by Pioneer Labs and the University of Chicago has taken on those issues and offer some interesting observations.
They note that this research could ultimately help maintain “oasis Earth,” arguing that technologies spurred by inhabiting Mars — such as desiccation-resistant crops, efficiently remediating soil, and improved ecosystem modeling – would likely benefit our resident planet.
A future Mars protected from the direct solar wind should come to a new equilibrium allowing an extensive atmosphere to support liquid water on its
surface.
Credit: J.L.Green, et al.
Vital testbed
“Mars terraforming research offers a vital testbed for planetary science, potentially validating theories or exposing knowledge gaps,” they explain in a newly-issued research paper appearing in Nature Astronomy. “Continued research promises significant scientific progress, regardless of whether full-scale terraforming occurs.”
The research paper, led by Erika Alden DeBenedictis, CEO of Pioneer Labs in San Francisco, California, also notes: “While the possibilities are exciting, anything as big as modification of a planetary climate has major consequences and would require careful thought once we reach the point where it is feasible.”
Without more research, DeBenedictis and colleagues add, “we do not even know what is physically or biologically possible.”
Artist’s concept depicts astronauts and human habitats on Mars.
Image credit: NASA
Should we…can we?
The researchers also underscore that any movement of humans beyond Earth raises ethical issues. “It is a trope of science fiction that, even though humans have already restructured Earth’s land surface, nitrogen cycle and so on at the planetary scale, attempts to do the same for other worlds will be seen as dysfunctional.”
Underlying the paper’s observations is that an important part of the “should we?” is the question “can we?”
“Believe it or not, no one has really addressed whether it’s feasible to terraform Mars since 1991,” said Nina Lanza, a planetary scientist at Los Alamos National Laboratory and a co-author on the paper.
“Yet since then,” Lanza points out, “we’ve made great strides in Mars science, geoengineering, launch capabilities and bioscience, which give us a chance to take a fresh look at terraforming research and ask ourselves what’s actually possible.”
Depiction shows Jezero Crater — the landing locale of the Mars 2020 Perseverance rover — as it might have appeared billions of years ago when it was perhaps a life-sustaining lake. An inlet and outlet are also visible on either side of the lake.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Marsshot
The Nature Astronomy perspective paper draws from the proceedings of an April 2024 Mars Terraforming Workshop held in Pasadena, California and hosted by The Astera Institute and Pioneer Labs.
As an Astera Institute resident working to terraform Mars, DeBenedictis founded Pioneer Labs, a nonprofit with a “moonshot,” better yet a “marsshot” mission, to transform microbes to be able to live on Mars.
“Some people might argue that Green Mars is not really a practical application of bioengineering, beyond that transition between a dead planet and a live one,” DeBenedictis says, but asks what are other reasons for terraforming Mars?
Image credit: SpaceX
Eminently doable
“I like Green Mars as a thesis because it is, first of all. a really well defined problem statement. It is a verifiable vision of what could be accomplished in the long term,” says DeBenedictis.
“In terms of practicality, there’s a lot more work to be done, but it’s possible that greening Mars is eminently doable and shockingly fast and cheap,” DeBenedictis senses.
Recent work points to greening Mars within roughly 30-50 years, “in the department of $100B’s” DeBenedictis says, roughly the cost of the US’s interstate highway system.
In the new research paper, fully terraforming Mars “would be (at least) a multicentury project, during which Earth’s politics will change. What will not change, the paper adds, are the physical, chemical and biological constraints—the science—that can be uncovered only through more research.
Credit: Michael Carroll via Chris McKay
“Of course, the biggest problem with these estimates right now is that not enough people are thinking about it. We need more research, more thorough cost estimates, and more discussion about whether or not we want to actually do it if it’s possible,” DeBenedictis concludes.
To access the Nature Astronomy paper – “The case for Mars terraforming research” – go to:
To access the 2024 Mars Terraforming Workshop Proceedings, go to:
https://zenodo.org/records/11390070
For more information on Pioneer Labs, the work of Erika Alden DeBenedictis and colleagues to engineer microbes for Mars, go to
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