Seasons and weather on a tidally locked planet (for a story)

May 31, 2015 1:32 PM

I can't find any sources that really explain how they'd work to a science illiterate like me. Can anyone point me in the right direction? Even fiction will help, seeing as it's for a story of my own.

My story takes place on the twilight strip between the sunside and coldside, and most everyone lives deep down in caves. It's more fantasy than science-fiction but I'd still like some scientific basis on how the world works. I've already read a little about Star Wars' Twi'Lek home world, but would like more to go on. Like, would it be possible to have some topside agriculture? Would the constant wind drive you mad? Would all mountains be withered down to nothing because of said wind? My google-fu has failed me and so I humbly turn to y'all to give me pointers where to look.

I'm also looking for a reason why electrical gadgets might not work on the planet. Would electromagnetic radiation work, or would it be too harmful to humans in the long run?

Thanks for any help!

posted by trollnystan to Science & Nature (7 answers total)

Have you seen this worldbuilding.stackexchange question? Did you know that there's a world-building subsite of stack exchange?? Because that's awesome.
posted by wemayfreeze at 1:47 PM on May 31, 2015 [3 favorites]

Also this PDF called "Life on a tidally-locked planet.
posted by wemayfreeze at 1:57 PM on May 31, 2015 [2 favorites]

Response by poster: Thanks! This helps so much! =)
posted by trollnystan at 2:01 PM on May 31, 2015

Both found via this google search btw.
posted by wemayfreeze at 2:05 PM on May 31, 2015

That PDF doesn't seem to take into account more recent climate models that show the temperature differences to be much more moderate, enough so that large portions of the planet (as much as 30%, maybe up to 50%) could be habitable. I wish I had more time to do some actual research with cites, but my sense is that you could expect strong currents and lots of rain in addition to strong winds. Some agriculture (although maybe not of Earth plants) should be possible. The planet will probably be more habitable if it has large oceans like Earth does. Wind might erode mountains, but probably not as fast as rain and glaciers do. You'll want your planet to be tectonically active, as it turns out this is important to habitability.

Planets are more likely to be tidally locked the closer they are to their star, so habitable tidally locked planets would probably be orbiting a dimmer red star. Proximity to the star could potentially interfere with electronics, at least on the planet's surface, due to solar flares.

Check out astrobio.net for more info.
posted by fermion at 11:22 PM on May 31, 2015 [2 favorites]

Someone, I think these guys, did some simulations in the last few years and determined that if you had a tidally-locked planet covered in a global ocean, such that its surface was primarily ice, instead of having a liquid water surface in a circle on the sun-facing side as one might expect you would strangely enough get a shape rather like a lobster. I've come across clearer pictures of the lobster shape than in the figures of that paper but I don't remember where.
posted by XMLicious at 2:40 AM on June 1, 2015 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: Wow, thanks so much! This is all super helpful, I can't thank you guys enough. Time to start researching =)
posted by trollnystan at 5:44 AM on June 3, 2015