Surface Pressure

The Surface Pressure of an object is the force per unit area that the object's atmosphere exerts on its surface.

Property Details

Location

The Surface Pressure property is located in the Atmosphere section of the Surface tab of the object's properties panel. This section is only visible for Terrestrial Planets.

Units

Surface Pressure can be viewed and edited using the following units:

• Standard atmosphere (atm) = 101325 Pa
• Bar (bar) = 100000 Pa
• Kilopascal (kPa) = 1000 Pa
• Millibar (mbar) = 100 Pa
• Pascal (Pa) is the SI unit for pressure.

Simulation Effects

Atmosphere Mass

The Surface Pressure is related to the atmosphere mass, M_atmo, and radius of the object, R, and the surface gravity, g_s, of the object by the following equation:

$P = \frac{g_{s} M_{atmo}}{4\pi R^2}$

Surface Pressure will determine the Boiling Point and Freezing Point of water on the surface of an object.