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So NASA set to return to Venus with two new missions

Comments

  • Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators Posts: 3,641 Mod ✭✭✭✭Beeker


    Great to see this, Venus has been the poor cousin of Mars for far too long. Here's to good exploration and science.


  • Registered Users Posts: 774 ✭✭✭Poulgorm


    Why the interest in Venus. The atmospheric pressure on the surface is 92 times that of earth and the temperature is 500 degrees C. And it rains sulphuric acid. Not a nice place to spend a weekend, at all.

    Even Elon has no interest in the place.


  • Registered Users Posts: 19 science101


    Alleged Phosphine detection in the atmosphere probably helped a bit. One of the missions will will send something through the atmosphere, might solve that microbial life question that got all the attention last year


  • Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 90,537 Mod ✭✭✭✭Capt'n Midnight


    Beeker wrote: »
    Great to see this, Venus has been the poor cousin of Mars for far too long. Here's to good exploration and science.

    We're going to Venus too
    EnVision follows on from ESA’s highly successful Venus Express (2005-2014) that focused primarily on atmospheric research, but which also made dramatic discoveries that pointed to possible volcanic hotspots on the planet’s surface. JAXA’s Akatsuki spacecraft has also been studying the atmosphere since 2015. EnVision will significantly improve on the radar images of the surface obtained by NASA’s Magellan in the 1990s. Working together with NASA’s upcoming DAVINCI+ (Deep Atmosphere Venus Investigation of Noble gases, Chemistry, and Imaging) and VERITAS (Venus Emissivity, Radio Science, InSAR, Topography, and Spectroscopy) missions, the trio of new spacecraft will provide the most comprehensive study of Venus ever.


  • Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators Posts: 12,467 Mod ✭✭✭✭JupiterKid


    This is great news - Venus has most definitely been the neglected planet over the past 15 to 20 years since most of the exploration focus has been on Mars and the outer solar system. Long overdue.

    DaVinci is certainly one to watch here - it will descend through the thick atmosphere towards a tesserae region (believed to be much older than the more common basalt plains) of the planet and may even make a safe soft landing. We really need some new landers on Venus. There have been none since the Soviet Venera landers of the early 1980s - that’s 40 years ago now. :eek:

    Though not included in this latest batch of missions, perhaps we are not too far from the day when a new generation of balloons or even drones will be roaming the atmosphere. These concepts have been discussed for years now - time for some action.

    A planetary scientist on a space exploration forum I’m on opined that the current state of knowledge of Venus was roughly the level we had of Mars in the early 1990s, just before the big waves of rover and high resolution orbiter missions since that time that have revealed so much.


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