But Sanloup doubts that Mars has enough (if any) perovskite to explain the xenon in its atmosphere. Until the mystery of missing Martian xenon is solved, she says, the jury is still out on where Earth’s went.

This article is reproduced with permission from the magazine Nature. The article was first published on October 11, 2012.

15 Comments

1. 1. geojellyroll 03:14 PM 10/11/12

   
   Interesting article.
   
   However please exclude words like 'lurking' and hidden' in a 'science' article. No need to embellish physics and chemistry with anthropomorphic jargon. Science is fascinating on its own.

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2. 2. Jake Snow in reply to geojellyroll 04:47 PM 10/11/12

   I wouldn't classify hidden as an anthropomorphic term. Lurking is a stretch as well.

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3. 3. Acoyauh2 05:25 PM 10/11/12

   I like to show this kind of articles to my kids, and I've noticed they do like such 'embelishments' and enjoy articles like this. It does not bother me as a scientist (writing styles vary widely after all) and I fully support any attempt to get more people interested in science. There's a difference between science news and the actual technical reports, right?
   
   Where I do object is when they 'water down' the science, though. A good science writer should be able to explain sophisticated concepts without dumbing down the whole note - else they're in the wrong business. Not that that's the case here, but it's been known to happen in SA...
   

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4. 4. Na g n o s t ic 06:31 PM 10/11/12

   I was first impressed with the notion that atmospheric xenon is in lower abundance than say, 100 years ago.
   
   After reading the whole article, it became obvious that atmospheric xenon exists at the same level as always.
   
   The way the title and first paragraph are worded might lend some the notion that human activity has caused the scarcity of xenon.

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5. 5. celticmoon 01:09 AM 10/12/12

   Please continue to publish articles written in vernacular that non-scientists who read such material for pleasure and to continue learning throughout life can understand and enjoy. I appreciate that this may seem to "dumb down" articles for some of your more articulate readers, but as Acoyauh2 who plans to share this article with his children says, a little jargon can go a long way to attract curious young minds (and some older ones, too) without detrimate to the material.

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6. 6. pinetree 04:23 AM 10/12/12

   I lurk hidden in my den. Does that make me noble too? Perhaps full of gas at that.
   
   Agree it was a good article. But poor old Mars comes up short once again.

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7. 7. jtdwyer in reply to celticmoon 08:31 AM 10/12/12

   Somewhere there should be a source of information that describes current research results consistent with their actual findings that has not been embellished to appeal to children. That need was once served by Scientific American.
   
   Already most of the 'science' programs on TV employ zip & zoom editing, apparently to attract those with attention difficulties, and use 'baby' talk so as not to lose the presumed audience of children.
   
   Even one of the local TV weather reporters stresses that he's got the "easy to understand" weather forecast coming up real soon. I keep wondering whether anyone will be able to adequately explain potentially more challenging weather in the near future...

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8. 8. jtdwyer in reply to jtdwyer 08:37 AM 10/12/12

   I should point out that this article was provided by Nature News - my remarks about Scientific American were more general that this one article.
   
   BTW, if one is willing to wade through the ads, there's an interesting report on this research at:
   http://phys.org/news/2012-10-geochemist-duo-explanation-dearth-xenon.html

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9. 9. tsurman7 09:12 PM 10/12/12

   Maybe I'm asking for the obvious but, is Xenon important for the atmosphere?

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10. 10. jtdwyer in reply to tsurman7 10:10 PM 10/12/12

    Not really. The somewhat academic puzzle is simply why the proportion of xenon in Earth's & Mars' atmospheres should be different than primordial meteorites, since they formed from roughly the same region of the Solar system's protoplanetary disk. As the article states:
    "Our atmosphere contains far less xenon, relative to the lighter noble gases, than meteorites similiar to the rocky material that formed the Earth."

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11. 11. Lockley 11:39 PM 10/12/12

    Maybe xenon is not all that nobel. There are conditions in which xenon and fluorine form a compound the hexafluoride I seem to recall. Given the extreme condions of the solulibity experiment one may ask if there is another mineral that could create a bond with xenon long enough to cage the gas when conditions moderate.
    
    

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12. 12. DanSchultz 12:47 AM 10/13/12

    So where does Xenon "lurk" in the meteorites, if it cannot be held in the crystal structure of the rocks? How can there be more Xenon in meteorites with no gravity than on Earth with pretty respectable gravity?

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13. 13. jtdwyer in reply to DanSchultz 09:47 PM 10/14/12

    I'm just guessing here, but I think the idea is that other nobel gasses essentially dissolve in perovskite. As for the asteroids, I think they idea is that xenon (and other gasses and liquids) were intermixed with the other primordial material of the protoplanetary disk - held in tiny bubbles within the solid materials.
    Perhaps someone more knowledgeable can explain better...

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14. 14. gsweeney 04:14 PM 10/17/12

    Thumbs up for <celticmoonthumbs>, down for <geojellyroll>.
    Our science-speak is dry and uninteresting to the non-scientific
    world, let a bit of plain English liven it up.
    

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15. 15. LTony 04:44 PM 10/17/12

    Just to clarify, neither uranium nor plutonium (which doesn't exist naturally in rocks) has xenon anywhere in their decay chains. Dr. Sanloup should know better.

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