European and American physicists have developed a plasma facility that allows extracting oxygen from carbon dioxide molecules present in the Martian atmosphere. This was reported by the press service of the American Physical Institute.

“We assumed that the collision of high-energy electrons with CO molecules₂ will lead to the decomposition of this substance or to the release of heat. This energy can also be used to break down carbon dioxide. Together with colleagues from France and the Netherlands, we were able to experimentally confirm these hypotheses.”, – said associate professor of the University of Lisbon (Portugal) Vasco Guerra.

In the past six years, at the suggestion of Elon Musk, scientists have begun to seriously think about how humanity can begin the process of colonizing Mars and other potentially habitable planets. To do this, as the researchers now suggest, two problems need to be solved: to learn how to produce energy, as well as oxygen, water and food, using local resources.

As Guerra and his colleagues note, oxygen production will be one of the most important and energy-intensive tasks that the first colonists on Mars will face. To solve it, scientists are developing systems that can extract oxygen from the Martian air and soil. One such facility, MOXIE, was installed aboard the Perseverance rover and successfully tested on Mars in April last year.

MOXIE absorbs carbon dioxide, heats it up to 800 degrees Celsius and passes it through a special ceramic material that breaks down CO₂ to oxygen (O₂) and carbon monoxide (CO). European physicists and their American colleagues have developed an alternative approach that markedly outperforms the MOXIE system in terms of compactness and oxygen production efficiency.

The installation created by scientists relies in its work on the fact that CO molecules₂ become much less stable if they are placed inside a rarefied plasma, the electrons inside of which have a much higher energy than ions and neutral molecules. In theory, this allows the splitting of CO₂ to carbon monoxide and oxygen if CO molecules₂ will often encounter electron beams with well-defined properties.

Guided by this idea, Guerra and his colleagues conducted a series of experiments during which they studied the interactions of oxygen, carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide inside an inhomogeneous plasma. These experiments helped scientists to choose such operating parameters, in which oxygen almost did not combine with carbon monoxide and did not form new CO molecules.₂.

As the researchers note, the production of oxygen using plasma does not require heating the Martian air to temperatures exceeding 30-40 degrees Celsius, as well as high pressure. In the future, this will significantly reduce the cost of energy and resources for the production of oxygen on Mars, the physicists summed up.