{"id":1084,"date":"2009-08-21T09:40:00","date_gmt":"2009-08-21T07:40:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/the_mystery_of_martian_methane\/"},"modified":"2026-10-08T00:35:50","modified_gmt":"2026-10-07T22:35:50","slug":"the_mystery_of_martian_methane","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/the_mystery_of_martian_methane\/","title":{"rendered":"Le myst\u00e8re du m\u00e9thane martien"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Y a-t-il de la vie sur Mars ? Certes, personne ne s'attend \u00e0 y trouver des Martiens intelligents, comme ceux que l'on voit dans le film \u2018 La Guerre des mondes \u2019. Cependant, les r\u00e9sultats fournis par la sonde Mars Express de l'ESA et par des observatoires terrestres sugg\u00e8rent que des formes de vie simples pourraient se cacher sous la surface de la plan\u00e8te rouge.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

La cl\u00e9 du myst\u00e8re est le m\u00e9thane, un gaz utilis\u00e9 sur Terre pour cuisiner et se chauffer. Une grande partie du m\u00e9thane dans notre atmosph\u00e8re est lib\u00e9r\u00e9e par des formes de vie avanc\u00e9es, comme le b\u00e9tail lorsqu\u2019il dig\u00e8re ses aliments. Cependant, il existe d\u2019autres moyens de produire du m\u00e9thane, comme l\u2019activit\u00e9 volcanique.<\/p>\n

Du m\u00e9thane a \u00e9t\u00e9 d\u00e9couvert sur Mars en 2003. Ce gaz \u00e9tant capable de se dissoudre facilement, sa dur\u00e9e de survie dans l\u2019atmosph\u00e8re martienne avait \u00e9t\u00e9 \u00e9valu\u00e9e \u00e0 300 ann\u00e9es. Des analyses plus pouss\u00e9es ont montr\u00e9 que le m\u00e9thane \u00e9tait en r\u00e9alit\u00e9 concentr\u00e9 dans trois r\u00e9gions. Cela prouvait qu\u2019il \u00e9tait lib\u00e9r\u00e9 ce m\u00eame moment et que nous le d\u00e9tections avant qu\u2019il n\u2019ait eu le temps de se r\u00e9pandre sur la plan\u00e8te.<\/p>\n

Puis Mars nous a r\u00e9serv\u00e9 une autre surprise. Au lieu de prendre 300 ans pour se dissiper, le m\u00e9thane avait presque enti\u00e8rement disparu au d\u00e9but de l\u2019ann\u00e9e 2006. Quelque chose l\u2019\u00e9liminait de l\u2019atmosph\u00e8re 600 fois plus rapidement que pr\u00e9vu. Les scientifiques de l\u2019ESA pensent que la surface de la plan\u00e8te pourrait en \u00eatre la cause. Soit le m\u00e9thane est pris dans la poussi\u00e8re, soit des produits chimiques hautement r\u00e9actifs, comme le peroxyde d\u2019hydrog\u00e8ne, le d\u00e9truisent. Cela pourrait signifier que la surface de la plan\u00e8te est encore plus hostile \u00e0 la vie qu\u2019on ne le pensait. Si tel est le cas, les futurs explorateurs devront percer tr\u00e8s profond pour trouver des signes de vie pass\u00e9s ou pr\u00e9sents.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Is there life on Mars? Certainly, no one expects to find intelligent Martians, like those seen in the movie, ‘War of the Worlds’. However, results from ESA\u2019s Mars Express orbiter […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"esa_banner_image":"https:\/\/www.esa.int\/var\/esa\/storage\/images\/esa_multimedia\/images\/2008\/12\/mars_express6\/17874075-2-eng-GB\/Mars_Express.jpg","esa_banner_description":"Mars Express","esa_banner_credit":"Alex Lutkus","esa_banner_licence":"ESA Standard Licence","esa_banner_detail_url":"https:\/\/www.esa.int\/ESA_Multimedia\/Images\/2008\/12\/Mars_Express6","esa_external_url":"","esa_external_new_window":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":true},"categories":[10,11,12],"tags":[],"panel":[],"language":[],"age":[],"duration":[],"resource_type":[],"audience":[],"wf_post_folders":[],"class_list":["post-1084","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-learn","category-our-universe","category-planets-and-moons"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1084","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1084"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1084\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2227,"href":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1084\/revisions\/2227"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1084"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1084"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1084"},{"taxonomy":"panel","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/panel?post=1084"},{"taxonomy":"language","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/language?post=1084"},{"taxonomy":"age","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/age?post=1084"},{"taxonomy":"duration","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/duration?post=1084"},{"taxonomy":"resource_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/resource_type?post=1084"},{"taxonomy":"audience","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/audience?post=1084"},{"taxonomy":"wf_post_folders","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kids.esa.int\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/wf_post_folders?post=1084"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}