Earth's atmosphere No other planet in the solar system has an atmosphere loaded with free oxygen, which is vital to one of the other unique features of Earth: life. Air surrounds Earth and becomes thinner farther from the surface.
Io, Ganymede, and Europa all have oxygen in their atmospheres, and roaming could be the cause. Io is a volcanic place – the most volcanic world in the Solar System – so life is ruled out there. Ganymede and Europa have subsurface oceans, so they could potentially harbour life.
Among the planets, Earth is unique for its oxygen-rich atmosphere. None of the other terrestrial planets contain much oxygen in their atmosphere, despite oxygen being a rather common element in the cosmos. Part of the reason for this is that oxygen binds easily with other elements.
Problem 3 – Which planet has the atmosphere with the greatest percentage of Oxygen? Answer: From the table we see that Mercury has the greatest percentage of oxygen in its atmosphere.
The atmosphere of the planet Uranus contains mostly hydrogen, helium, and methane. Interestingly, the methane in the atmosphere is what gives Uranus its distinctive blue color. Since Uranus contains effectively zero free oxygen, the hydrogen and methane in the atmosphere does not burn or explode.
Mars does have an atmosphere, but it is about 100 times thinner than Earth's atmosphere and it has very little oxygen. The atmosphere on Mars is made up of mainly carbon dioxide. An astronaut on Mars would not be able to breathe the Martian air and would need a spacesuit with oxygen to work outdoors.
This thick blanket of gas traps the sun's radiation and heats the planet's surface to a whopping 872 degrees F (467 degrees C). The surface of Venus is the hottest in the solar system -- hotter even than Mercury, which is closer to the sun! Venus is too hot to have any type of ice on it.
Venus has a thick, toxic atmosphere filled with carbon dioxide and it's perpetually shrouded in thick, yellowish clouds of sulfuric acid that trap heat, causing a runaway greenhouse effect. It's the hottest planet in our solar system, even though Mercury is closer to the Sun.
Even the hardiest cells known could not possibly survive the cosmic radiation near the surface of Mars since Mars lost its protective magnetosphere and atmosphere.
More than 40 per cent of the lunar crust is composed of oxygen. This oxygen is bound up in minerals in combination with other elements as compounds called oxides.
Among the stunning variety of worlds in our solar system, only Earth is known to host life.
Flexi Says: Right now and for the foreseeable future, humans can only live on Earth. Humans have not traveled very far into space. The Moon is the only other place humans have visited. No other planet in our solar system currently has the conditions to support life as we know it on Earth.
Neptune is our solar system's windiest world. Despite its great distance and low energy input from the Sun, Neptune's winds can be three times stronger than Jupiter's and nine times stronger than Earth's.
Uranus' environment is not conducive to life as we know it. The temperatures, pressures, and materials that characterize this planet are most likely too extreme and volatile for organisms to adapt to.
But Earth is the only known planet (or moon) to have consistent, stable bodies of liquid water on its surface. In our solar system, Earth orbits around the sun in an area called the habitable zone.
Oxygen is a life-sustaining element that makes up about twenty percent of the air we breathe. Our research suggests that the stepwise rise of O2 in our atmosphere is easily explainable through simple chemical reactions, suggesting that breathable atmospheres may be relatively commonplace.
The temperatures, pressures, and materials that characterize this planet are most likely too extreme and volatile for organisms to adapt to. While planet Jupiter is an unlikely place for living things to take hold, the same is not true of some of its many moons.
Before Earth and the Moon, there were proto-Earth and Theia (a roughly Mars-sized planet). The giant-impact model suggests that at some point in Earth's very early history, these two bodies collided.
Most astronomers feel that it would be impossible for life to exist on Venus. Today, Venus is a very hostile place. It is a very dry planet with no evidence of water, its surface temperature is hot enough to melt lead, and its atmosphere is so thick that the air pressure on its surface is over 90 times that on Earth.
Uranus holds the record for the coldest temperature ever measured in the Solar System: a very chilly -224℃. The temperature on Neptune is still very cold, of course – usually around -214℃ – but Uranus beats that. The reason why Uranus is so cold is nothing to do with its distance from the Sun.
Although there is so far no evidence of life on Titan, its complex chemistry and unique environments are certain to make it a destination for continued exploration.
The smallest known extrasolar planet that is likely a "gas planet" is Kepler-138d, which has the same mass as Earth but is 60% larger and therefore has a density that indicates a thick gas envelope.
Saturn's moon Dione has a mostly water ice surface and may contain a deep subsurface ocean of liquid water. Enceladus is another famous icy moon like Europa – the surface is covered in water ice, and beneath the south pole is a subsurface ocean of liquid water.
Both poles on Mars have ice caps that grow and shrink with the seasons. These ice caps are made mainly of water ice. During winter near the poles, carbon dioxide in the atmosphere freezes and falls to the surface.
Welcome to the world where the ice burns.
Then there's Gliese 436 b (otherwise known as GJ 436 b). This alien world is located approximately 30 light-years from Earth towards the constellation of Leo.