The cotton candy in the form of a cloud on Mars is revealed …

Liputan6.com, Jakarta – A recent study reveals the mystery of cotton-candy-shaped clouds on the planet Mars. Apparently, the phenomenon has a connection with a destroyed meteor.

Researchers have shown that the process of destroying meteors in the atmosphere has created special dust particles. The fine grains then formed thin clouds.

"Clouds do not form by themselves," said Victoria Hartwick, a postgraduate student at the University of Colorado at Boulder and head of the research team, in a statement quoted in this page. Space.com on Tuesday (18/06/2019). According to him, clouds "need something that can be compacted".

During the process of formation of clouds on the Earth, white clusters are formed by the presence of water molecules attached to sea salt that is projected into the air. Something similar has also happened on Mars. Unfortunately, the red planet lacks particles like sea salt.

However, the dust of destroyed meteors – known as "meteoric vapors" – plays an important role in the formation of clouds near the Earth's poles.

Hartwick and his colleagues investigated whether meteoric smoke could also create clouds in Mars' central atmosphere. And the answer is positive.

"Our model can not form clouds at this altitude before entering into meteoric smoke particles," Hartwick said. "But now they are all here and they seem to be in the right place."

Cloud in the shape of cotton candy

Apparently, the types of clouds on Mars vary. Scientists have discovered thin clouds stretching 30 to 60 kilometers above the surface, the heat is in the middle of the red planet's atmosphere.

The cloud has the shape of a candy sugar, precisely cotton, which is smaller than most clouds on Earth. Do not get me wrong, even if it's not big, it can dramatically affect the weather in Mars.