Venus is one of the most secretive planets in the solar system, continuing to throw up new clues about its nature. Named after the goddess of beauty and love, Venus does not have any natural satellites and orbits the sun every 224.7 days, with a rotation period of 243 days in an opposite direction to that followed by the majority of other planets (Stevenson 191). In 2005, the European Space Agency launched a spacecraft to Venus, which reached the planet’s upper atmosphere in 2014 enabling the ESA to make new discoveries about the planet. One of the major recent discoveries is that the planet has thousands of volcanoes and numerous volcanic plains spread across the surface, suggesting that Venus has active volcanoes at present. Large sulfur dioxide fluctuations in Venus’ atmosphere, compared to that determined by the earlier NASA Magellan orbiter and the ESA spacecraft in 2006, has offered indirect evidence of significant volcanic eruption (Stevenson 191).
Another major discovery about Venus is that the planet’s spinning or rotation is slowing down, with Venus Express determining that some of the planet’s features were displaced by almost twenty kilometers in comparison to where they should have been. The previous NASA Magellan orbiter determined the length of Venus’ rotation was 243.0185 earth days, whereas ESA’s Venus Express determined that some of the landforms 16 years later would only line up to Magellan’s observations if days on Venus were 6.5 minutes longer on average (Clark 240). A third major discovery about Venus is that the upper atmosphere’s super-rotation has sped up since the last planetary probe 16 years ago. In this case, Venus Express tracked distinctive cloud features since it arrived in the Planet’s orbit in 2006, noting that the high level winds in Venus speed up over time. Compared with data from the Magellan orbiter from 16 years ago, dramatic wind speed variations have been observed ranging from lows 3.9 days for one sweep across the planet to a high of 5.3 days (Clark 240).
A fourth major recent discovery about Venus is that the planet has a surprisingly cold region in the upper atmosphere, which is in contrast to contemporary thought of Venus as an extremely hot planet (Limaye 29). While Venus’ surface is extremely hot, a frigid layer in which CO2 could freeze into snow or ice was discovered that is colder or chillier than any section of the atmosphere on earth. A fifth discovery is that Venus has an atmospheric layer comparable to the ozone layer on earth. This ozone layer in Venus’ atmosphere is located between ninety and one hundred and twenty km across the atmosphere and is confined to a 5-10km thin layer, compared to the ozone layer on earth that is located between fifteen and fifty km in the atmosphere (Limaye 29). Furthermore, Venus’ ozone layer has a significantly lower density than the ozone of earth, and is particularly tenuous at the poles.
Furthermore, another recent discovery is that Venus loses water with large quantities of water being lost over billions of years into space. The ESA’s Venus Express detected atmospheric loss of water on the planet’s day side, as well as a rapid loss of atomic oxygen and hydrogen into space from the planet’s night side (Kumar 126). The water depletion occurs due to splitting of water molecules in the planet’s upper atmosphere caused by solar UV radiation followed by the action of solar wind that carries the atoms into space. Venus, unlike earth, lacks a self-generated magnetic field that would protect the planet from losing atmospheric constituents due to the actions of solar winds. The ESA’s Venus Express determined that escaping hydrogen atoms were twice as escaping oxygen, confirming that these escaping atoms were from water molecules (Kumar 126).
- Clark, Jane. “Observing the Solar System from Your Armchair.” Viewing and Imaging the Solar System. Springer New York, 2015. 223-244. Print.
- Kumar, Mohi. “Scientists Identify Exploration Goals for Venus.” Eos, Transactions American Geophysical Union 95.15 (2014): 125-127. Print.
- Limaye, Sanjay. “Mercury and Venus: Significant Results from MESSENGER and Venus Express Missions.” Inner Solar System, 2015. 1(2), 29-56. Print.
- Stevenson, David. “Venus.” The Exo-Weather Report. Springer International Publishing, 2016. 191-230. Print.
Venus is one of the most secretive planets in the solar system, continuing to throw up new clues about its nature. Named after the goddess of beauty and love, Venus does not have any natural satellites and orbits the sun every 224.7 days, with a rotation period of 243 days in an opposite direction to that followed by the majority of other planets (Stevenson 191). In 2005, the European Space Agency launched a spacecraft to Venus, which reached the planet’s upper atmosphere in 2014 enabling the ESA to make new discoveries about the planet. One of the major recent discoveries is that the planet has thousands of volcanoes and numerous volcanic plains spread across the surface, suggesting that Venus has active volcanoes at present. Large sulfur dioxide fluctuations in Venus’ atmosphere, compared to that determined by the earlier NASA Magellan orbiter and the ESA spacecraft in 2006, has offered indirect evidence of significant volcanic eruption (Stevenson 191).
Another major discovery about Venus is that the planet’s spinning or rotation is slowing down, with Venus Express determining that some of the planet’s features were displaced by almost twenty kilometers in comparison to where they should have been. The previous NASA Magellan orbiter determined the length of Venus’ rotation was 243.0185 earth days, whereas ESA’s Venus Express determined that some of the landforms 16 years later would only line up to Magellan’s observations if days on Venus were 6.5 minutes longer on average (Clark 240). A third major discovery about Venus is that the upper atmosphere’s super-rotation has sped up since the last planetary probe 16 years ago. In this case, Venus Express tracked distinctive cloud features since it arrived in the Planet’s orbit in 2006, noting that the high level winds in Venus speed up over time. Compared with data from the Magellan orbiter from 16 years ago, dramatic wind speed variations have been observed ranging from lows 3.9 days for one sweep across the planet to a high of 5.3 days (Clark 240).
A fourth major recent discovery about Venus is that the planet has a surprisingly cold region in the upper atmosphere, which is in contrast to contemporary thought of Venus as an extremely hot planet (Limaye 29). While Venus’ surface is extremely hot, a frigid layer in which CO2 could freeze into snow or ice was discovered that is colder or chillier than any section of the atmosphere on earth. A fifth discovery is that Venus has an atmospheric layer comparable to the ozone layer on earth. This ozone layer in Venus’ atmosphere is located between ninety and one hundred and twenty km across the atmosphere and is confined to a 5-10km thin layer, compared to the ozone layer on earth that is located between fifteen and fifty km in the atmosphere (Limaye 29). Furthermore, Venus’ ozone layer has a significantly lower density than the ozone of earth, and is particularly tenuous at the poles.
Furthermore, another recent discovery is that Venus loses water with large quantities of water being lost over billions of years into space. The ESA’s Venus Express detected atmospheric loss of water on the planet’s day side, as well as a rapid loss of atomic oxygen and hydrogen into space from the planet’s night side (Kumar 126). The water depletion occurs due to splitting of water molecules in the planet’s upper atmosphere caused by solar UV radiation followed by the action of solar wind that carries the atoms into space. Venus, unlike earth, lacks a self-generated magnetic field that would protect the planet from losing atmospheric constituents due to the actions of solar winds. The ESA’s Venus Express determined that escaping hydrogen atoms were twice as escaping oxygen, confirming that these escaping atoms were from water molecules (Kumar 126).
- Clark, Jane. “Observing the Solar System from Your Armchair.” Viewing and Imaging the Solar System. Springer New York, 2015. 223-244. Print.
- Kumar, Mohi. “Scientists Identify Exploration Goals for Venus.” Eos, Transactions American Geophysical Union 95.15 (2014): 125-127. Print.
- Limaye, Sanjay. “Mercury and Venus: Significant Results from MESSENGER and Venus Express Missions.” Inner Solar System, 2015. 1(2), 29-56. Print.
- Stevenson, David. “Venus.” The Exo-Weather Report. Springer International Publishing, 2016. 191-230. Print.
