Heard of the greenhouse effect? Well, now there is an anti-greenhouse effect.
Basically, the greenhouse effect is something that traps sunlight and blocks infrared radiation from leaving the atmosphere, causing it to become warmer. An anti-greenhouse is the direct opposite (POLAR opposite, haha) of the greenhouse effect. It prevents sunlight from going in, and lets infrared radiation out. Polar indeed!
So far only Titan, a moon of Saturn, has been known to have the anti-greenhouse effect. "the anti-greenhouse effect on Titan reduces the surface temperature by 9 K whereas the greenhouse effect increases it by 21 K. The net effect is that the surface temperature (94 K) is 12 K warmer than the effective temperature 82 K. [i.e., the equilibrium that would be reached in the absence of any atmosphere]"(McKay et al, 1991).
Well, if the Earth has such an anti-greenhouse effect then maybe it could counter some of the greenhouse effects, like it did in Titan. As the Earth has a natural greenhouse effect (water vapour and carbon dioxide mainly) as well as a man-made one (extra carbon dioxide from factories,etc.) maybe scientists can try to create a man-made anti-greenhouse effect! Then we can save the polar ice caps!
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