Breeding on another planet

[jnb]

If humans were to colonize Mars and then someone was to be born on Mars and then travel to Earth, what problems might they encounter? Would the fact that they are from a species evolved to cope with 10ms-2 gravity be more important than the fact that they were born and raised in 4ms-2 gravity. Would 4ms-2 be sufficient to avoid the problems that astronauts encounter if in space for long periods of time?

... that was posed to me by one of my students today!

 

[mikeDnight]

I suspect there would be problems from the start, particularly with bone growth and strength. Also, there will almost certainly be issues with blood cells. In near zero gravity red blood cells deform and become spiked, so in significantly lower gravity than the earth, red cells have the potential to pause problems. For someone who has never experienced earths gravity, it would be quite debilitating, as muscle and bone growth would be totally unused to the stresses it would exert on the body of the 'Martian'. 

Personally, I think we're better off where we are. Ideas of terraforming Mars are Alice in Wonderland! The planet could never be terraformed because it simply doesn't have enough mass to hold onto life giving oxygen, plus it has no magnetosphere to protect surface dwellers from the high energy particle bombardment from the Sun, so it's surface will remain sterile despite our endless attempts to cock it up. 

Mike

[Paul73]

We could act like ants and carve out tunnels and caverns. Or, we may have developed the technology to protect ourselves from the radiation??

Bare in mind that there is a big difference between Zero gravity and Low Gravity. I'm guessing that the heart may be underdeveloped and would have a tough time on coming to earth.

Paul

[JB80]

Not to give away any spoilers but the show Expanse kind of deals a little bit with this. Absolutely no idea how much research they have put into it but worth a watch.

[symesie04]

Well for starters i would imagine they would face long delays at passport control and doubt they would be able to pass straight through "Nothing to declare"

From what i have watched of Expanse it deals mainly with the health issues of those mainly living in the mining colonies in the asteroid belt which is partly due to the lack of gravity and partly due to lack of clean air. The few Martians we have seen so far seem to be perfectly healthy, they werent even particularly well tanned.

[Dave In Vermont]

The Martian might be advised to wear a spacesuit of some sort. When Europeans came to what was called Turtle Island for over 10,000 years, they had no immunity to many diseases that were considered harmless to the Native peoples. As the Native folks had no resistance to common European illnesses. The results were not good. Hard to say how a Martian would fare.

Remember H.G. Wells "War of the Worlds?"

The US quarantined the Apollo astronauts when they returned from the Moon. Seems they carried Moon-Bugs that caused a galloping case of paranoia.

Dave

[symesie04]

3 hours ago, Dave In Vermont said:

 

The US quarantined the Apollo astronauts when they returned from the Moon. Seems they carried Moon-Bugs that caused a galloping case of paranoia.

Dave

Interesting i thought they brought back a highly contagious strain of Conspiracyaria. Rather nasty business that sadly it seems can only be cured by termination.