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Does Aluminum rust on Mars

Updated: 8/11/2023
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13y ago

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NO

BUT....In outer space, metal objects don't rust exactly like they do on earth, but something similar to rusting can occur in space.

On earth, metal rusts when the iron atoms in the metal interact with water molecules. These interactions break the chemical bonds that hold the atoms in the metal together, and at the same time allow the atoms in the metal to form new bonds with oxygen atoms and/or water molecules, producing the red, crumbly material we know as rust. This material is actually a combination of metal atoms and oxygen atoms, so metal cannot rust on its own; oxygen or water needs to be added to it. In the vacuum of outer space, there is very little water or oxygen. A metal object therefore cannot rust in space like it would on Earth.

However, even in outer space there are still a few oxygen atoms around. Also, in space there are some types of light (called ultraviolet light) that can break chemical bonds between atoms (most of this ultraviolet light doesn't reach us here on the ground because it can't pass through the Earth's atmosphere). When these atoms and ultraviolet light strike metal in space, they can produce some of the same combinations of metal and oxygen atoms found in rust. Because the density of atoms in outer space is very low, it takes many years for much of this "rust" to form on any object. We can get a sense of just how slowly things rust in space by looking at iron meteorites, chunks of metal that have fallen to earth from outer space, Before they crash-landed on earth, these bits of metal drifted around the solar system for millions or even billions of years, and yet for the most part they are still chunks of pure metal with little rust. Even so, the small amount of rust formed on metal objects in outer space can be important because it changes the color and texture of the objects' surface. These surface changes happen not only to metal objects, but to rocks as well, and they need to be taken into account if scientists want to figure out what objects in outer space are made of based on how they look through telescopes.

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12y ago
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14y ago

Iron can rust in space. Here is why: Unlike the air we breathe, in low earth orbit there is a lot of atomic oxygen instead of molecular oxygen. Since atomic oxygen has no need to break the bonds between oxygen atoms, it is actually much more reactive than molecular oxygen. Within the spacecraft, the environment is similar to Earth. So as long as there is oxygen, the metals will try to oxidize.

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14y ago

well there can be , but some one would haft to put it there

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12y ago

no metalloid cannot rust because they posssess the characteristics of both metals and non metals. but they are not metals.they cannot be oxidize.

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13y ago

Aluminium does not "rust" no matter where it is. Rust only applies to iron or steel.

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6y ago

The only metal that can rust is iron.

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Q: Does Aluminum rust on Mars
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