Covered by a thick blanket of wispy white clouds, the planet
Venus is so bright in Earth's sky that it has been known since
prehistoric times. Indeed, often referred to as the "jewel of the sky,"
this planet that we call our "morning star" is named for the Roman
goddess of love and beauty. Although Venus has historically been called
Earth's "twin" sister planet, if it is our planet's twin sister, it is a
weird one--of similar mass, size, and chemical makeup, Earth and Venus
are vastly different in other ways. This is because even though the
conditions on Earth make it a haven for nurturing life, the bubbling
cauldron that is the hellish Venus features a "crushing" atmosphere,
clouds heavily laden with "corrosive sulfuric acid," and a "rocky desert
surface hot enough to melt lead." In 2014, planetary scientists
announced their new study suggesting that Venus may be stranger
still--once possessing bizarre oceans of carbon dioxide fluid that
helped shape its weird and inhospitable surface.
Writing in the August 2014 edition of the Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters, Dr. Dima Bolmatov, a theoretical physicist at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, and his team suggest that Venus could once have been the bizarre domain of oceans filled with carbon dioxide. After all, according to Dr. Bolmatov, carbon dioxide is abundant on Venus, making up an estimated 96.5 percent of its current atmosphere. In other words, while our lovely blue world has seas filled with sloshing life-sustaining water, the landscape of Venus might have been shaped by unusual swirling seas of carbon dioxide.
Many planetary scientists think that even though conditions on Venus are currently miserably hot and bone dry, this Earth-sized ball of hell might once--long ago--have sported delightful water oceans like those on Earth. Indeed, earlier research indicated that Venus once possessed a sufficient amount of life-sustaining water in its atmosphere to cover the entire planet in an ocean about 80 feet deep--if all that water could somehow have showered down to the surface of this planet as rain. However, Venus was likely too hot for such abundant water to cool down and precipitate to the surface, even if Venus did possess enough moisture.
Therefore, the team of planetary scientists led by Dr. Bolmatov concluded that it was much more likely that instead of being covered by lovely, swirling seas of delightful, life-sustaining water, Venus was once covered by bizarre seas of carbon dioxide fluid.
Carbon dioxide traps heat, and is one of the greenhouse gases linked to the warming climate on Earth. It can exist not only as a solid, a liquid, and a gas, but also in what is termed a supercritical state when it is pushed beyond a specific point of combined temperature and pressure. Supercritical fluids can possess properties belonging to both liquids and gases. For example, a supercritical fluid can flow like a gas, but can also dissolve materials like a liquid.
On Earth, carbon dioxide is exhaled by animals and used by plants for photosynthesis.
Earth's Weird "Twin" Sister Planet
Venus differs from all other bodies inhabiting our Solar System because it rotates from east to west. Therefore, Venus is--in a sense--upside down. Another strange property of this bizarre world is that its day is longer than its year. If observed from high above its north pole, Venus would look as if it were rotating clockwise. It it were possible, which it is not, for an Earthling to stand on the surface of this strange world, the Sun would rise in the West, wander lazily across the sky, and then set in the east. This is, of course, the exact opposite of what occurs on Earth. It takes Venus 225 Earth days to complete one orbit around our Sun--but it takes 243 days for Venus to rotate once on its axis.
Venus is not a hospitable world, despite its superficial resemblance to our own planet. The blanketing Venusian atmosphere composed primarily of carbon dioxide contains almost no water vapor. In fact, the atmosphere is so extraordinarily thick that the pressure on the Venusian surface is 92 times that of Earth! Surface pressure on Venus is comparable to being 900 meters under water.
Carbon dioxide readily permits solar radiation in, but will not allow it to escape back into space. This is very similar to the way a greenhouse works, and because of this runaway greenhouse effect temperatures on this weird planet's surface soar to over 900 degrees Fahrenheit. As if this were not enough, this hellish world's thick cloud layer contains sulfuric acid droplets. There is no water on Venus, but there may be pools of strong sulfuric acid. Beneath the deceptively harmless and delicate wispy cloud tops, Venus could readily be mistaken for Hades.
Venus is considerably hotter than it should be. Indeed, it is situated from our Sun at a distance where its surface temperature should "only" reach 212 degrees Fahrenheit--which is the boiling point of water. Alas for this searing-hot hell-like world, radio measurements obtained from Earth reveal that Venus has the hottest surface of any planet in our Solar System. Venus is even hotter than the planet Mercury, even though Mercury is the closest planet to the Sun! Venus is also highly volcanic, and its roasting surface gives the Venusian rocks a creepy, eerie reddish glow.
A trickle of drizzle detected on Venus back in the 1990s by the Soviet Union's balloon probes, Vega 1 and Vega 2, proved not to be a lovely, refreshing light shower of water droplets, but instead a "rain" composed of tiny little drops of corrosive sulfuric acid.
The Soviet Union had joined with a handful of other European nations in 1984 to launch the Vega Probes, a technologically challenging and sophisticated accomplishment. The mission plopped twin balloons and landers on the tortured surface of this seething hot world, and the duo of 3.5 meter-diameter balloons floated around for almost two Earth-days in the weird Venusian atmosphere at 55 kilometers above its surface. The atmosphere of Venus is delightful--in contrast to the inhospitable surface below. At this lofty height, the pressure and temperature are both comparable to Earth's own average, and there is also enough sunlight to shimmer in from above.
But this bedeviled world is not comfortable. If there ever was a time, long ago, when Venus possessed lovely frothing blue oceans and seas of liquid water, the runaway greenhouse effect would have relentlessly heated these ancient bodies of lovely life-supporting liquid to the tragic point that they simply boiled away and evaporated. The presence of liquid water is necessary to support life as we know it--liquid water makes it possible for certain important chemical reactions to occur on Earth. These reactions snare unstable carbon and sulfur compounds, and then keep them imprisoned within rocks. On bone-dry Venus, however, these volatile gases stay in the atmosphere, and add to the runaway greenhouse effect.
The Venusian surface cannot be observed from our own planet. This is because the secretive world is veiled in a shroud of dense clouds that reflect sunshine. However, space probes dispatched to Venus removed the obscuring veil, and showed Venus to possess a surface scarred by impact craters. The unlucky planet also possesses at least 1,600 major volcanoes, although they are smaller than those of our own planet. In addition,the Venusian surface shows vast lava plains, extensive highlands, and mountains. Then, of course, there are those strange clouds of sulfuric acid that swirl around in the dense Venusian atmosphere, pelting the tragic world with sulfuric acid raindrops.
The U.S. Mariner spacecraft, launched back in 1962, was only able to send back to Earth images of a secretive, "twin" sister world veiled in thick clouds. The real breakthroughs at long last came with NASA's Pioneer Venus in 1978 and Magellan in 1990. Pioneer Venus succeeded in obtaining some low resolution mapping of the Venusian surface, while the Soviet Venera Probes (1961-1984) landed on its surface, but were only able to send back a handful of poorly aimed images before they were disabled by the severe pressure and temperature of our unfortunate "twin" sister planet. However, the probes did manage to reveal a rocky, barren terrain. Magellan relied on high-definition radar to map Venus in detail, and it showed a relatively youthful surface, consisting of lava flow covered plains, as well as highland regions that had been created by geological activity. With thousands of volcanoes and an abundance of impact craters scarring its seething-hot surface, Venus is apparently a very active world experiencing constant change.
Seas Of Carbon Dioxide!
The team of planetary scientists led by Dr. Bolmatov believed that the physical properties of supercritical fluids gradually changed with temperature and pressure. However, computer simulations indicated something else. In fact, the computer simulations suggested that supercritical matter could experience a dramatic, rapid sea-change from gas-like properties to liquid-like ones.
Even though the atmospheric pressure of Venus at the surface is over 90 times that found on Earth today, this has not always been the case. During the earliest days of our weird sister planet's formation, the pressure may have been far greater, according to Dr. Bolmatov and his team. If those conditions had lasted for at least 100 million years, they might have resulted in the formation of supercritical carbon dioxide with liquid-like properties.
As a result, Dr. Bolmatov and his colleagues believe that it is entirely possible that geological features such as river-like beds, rift valleys, and plains on the Venusian surface are "the fingerprints of near-surface activity of liquid-like supercritical carbon dioxide." Furthermore, the team of planetary scientists found that, depending on the temperature and pressure, gas-like supercritical carbon dioxide clusters resembling soap bubbles may have also formed on our weird sister planet's strange and alien surface!
Writing in the August 2014 edition of the Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters, Dr. Dima Bolmatov, a theoretical physicist at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, and his team suggest that Venus could once have been the bizarre domain of oceans filled with carbon dioxide. After all, according to Dr. Bolmatov, carbon dioxide is abundant on Venus, making up an estimated 96.5 percent of its current atmosphere. In other words, while our lovely blue world has seas filled with sloshing life-sustaining water, the landscape of Venus might have been shaped by unusual swirling seas of carbon dioxide.
Many planetary scientists think that even though conditions on Venus are currently miserably hot and bone dry, this Earth-sized ball of hell might once--long ago--have sported delightful water oceans like those on Earth. Indeed, earlier research indicated that Venus once possessed a sufficient amount of life-sustaining water in its atmosphere to cover the entire planet in an ocean about 80 feet deep--if all that water could somehow have showered down to the surface of this planet as rain. However, Venus was likely too hot for such abundant water to cool down and precipitate to the surface, even if Venus did possess enough moisture.
Therefore, the team of planetary scientists led by Dr. Bolmatov concluded that it was much more likely that instead of being covered by lovely, swirling seas of delightful, life-sustaining water, Venus was once covered by bizarre seas of carbon dioxide fluid.
Carbon dioxide traps heat, and is one of the greenhouse gases linked to the warming climate on Earth. It can exist not only as a solid, a liquid, and a gas, but also in what is termed a supercritical state when it is pushed beyond a specific point of combined temperature and pressure. Supercritical fluids can possess properties belonging to both liquids and gases. For example, a supercritical fluid can flow like a gas, but can also dissolve materials like a liquid.
On Earth, carbon dioxide is exhaled by animals and used by plants for photosynthesis.
Earth's Weird "Twin" Sister Planet
Venus differs from all other bodies inhabiting our Solar System because it rotates from east to west. Therefore, Venus is--in a sense--upside down. Another strange property of this bizarre world is that its day is longer than its year. If observed from high above its north pole, Venus would look as if it were rotating clockwise. It it were possible, which it is not, for an Earthling to stand on the surface of this strange world, the Sun would rise in the West, wander lazily across the sky, and then set in the east. This is, of course, the exact opposite of what occurs on Earth. It takes Venus 225 Earth days to complete one orbit around our Sun--but it takes 243 days for Venus to rotate once on its axis.
Venus is not a hospitable world, despite its superficial resemblance to our own planet. The blanketing Venusian atmosphere composed primarily of carbon dioxide contains almost no water vapor. In fact, the atmosphere is so extraordinarily thick that the pressure on the Venusian surface is 92 times that of Earth! Surface pressure on Venus is comparable to being 900 meters under water.
Carbon dioxide readily permits solar radiation in, but will not allow it to escape back into space. This is very similar to the way a greenhouse works, and because of this runaway greenhouse effect temperatures on this weird planet's surface soar to over 900 degrees Fahrenheit. As if this were not enough, this hellish world's thick cloud layer contains sulfuric acid droplets. There is no water on Venus, but there may be pools of strong sulfuric acid. Beneath the deceptively harmless and delicate wispy cloud tops, Venus could readily be mistaken for Hades.
Venus is considerably hotter than it should be. Indeed, it is situated from our Sun at a distance where its surface temperature should "only" reach 212 degrees Fahrenheit--which is the boiling point of water. Alas for this searing-hot hell-like world, radio measurements obtained from Earth reveal that Venus has the hottest surface of any planet in our Solar System. Venus is even hotter than the planet Mercury, even though Mercury is the closest planet to the Sun! Venus is also highly volcanic, and its roasting surface gives the Venusian rocks a creepy, eerie reddish glow.
A trickle of drizzle detected on Venus back in the 1990s by the Soviet Union's balloon probes, Vega 1 and Vega 2, proved not to be a lovely, refreshing light shower of water droplets, but instead a "rain" composed of tiny little drops of corrosive sulfuric acid.
The Soviet Union had joined with a handful of other European nations in 1984 to launch the Vega Probes, a technologically challenging and sophisticated accomplishment. The mission plopped twin balloons and landers on the tortured surface of this seething hot world, and the duo of 3.5 meter-diameter balloons floated around for almost two Earth-days in the weird Venusian atmosphere at 55 kilometers above its surface. The atmosphere of Venus is delightful--in contrast to the inhospitable surface below. At this lofty height, the pressure and temperature are both comparable to Earth's own average, and there is also enough sunlight to shimmer in from above.
But this bedeviled world is not comfortable. If there ever was a time, long ago, when Venus possessed lovely frothing blue oceans and seas of liquid water, the runaway greenhouse effect would have relentlessly heated these ancient bodies of lovely life-supporting liquid to the tragic point that they simply boiled away and evaporated. The presence of liquid water is necessary to support life as we know it--liquid water makes it possible for certain important chemical reactions to occur on Earth. These reactions snare unstable carbon and sulfur compounds, and then keep them imprisoned within rocks. On bone-dry Venus, however, these volatile gases stay in the atmosphere, and add to the runaway greenhouse effect.
The Venusian surface cannot be observed from our own planet. This is because the secretive world is veiled in a shroud of dense clouds that reflect sunshine. However, space probes dispatched to Venus removed the obscuring veil, and showed Venus to possess a surface scarred by impact craters. The unlucky planet also possesses at least 1,600 major volcanoes, although they are smaller than those of our own planet. In addition,the Venusian surface shows vast lava plains, extensive highlands, and mountains. Then, of course, there are those strange clouds of sulfuric acid that swirl around in the dense Venusian atmosphere, pelting the tragic world with sulfuric acid raindrops.
The U.S. Mariner spacecraft, launched back in 1962, was only able to send back to Earth images of a secretive, "twin" sister world veiled in thick clouds. The real breakthroughs at long last came with NASA's Pioneer Venus in 1978 and Magellan in 1990. Pioneer Venus succeeded in obtaining some low resolution mapping of the Venusian surface, while the Soviet Venera Probes (1961-1984) landed on its surface, but were only able to send back a handful of poorly aimed images before they were disabled by the severe pressure and temperature of our unfortunate "twin" sister planet. However, the probes did manage to reveal a rocky, barren terrain. Magellan relied on high-definition radar to map Venus in detail, and it showed a relatively youthful surface, consisting of lava flow covered plains, as well as highland regions that had been created by geological activity. With thousands of volcanoes and an abundance of impact craters scarring its seething-hot surface, Venus is apparently a very active world experiencing constant change.
Seas Of Carbon Dioxide!
The team of planetary scientists led by Dr. Bolmatov believed that the physical properties of supercritical fluids gradually changed with temperature and pressure. However, computer simulations indicated something else. In fact, the computer simulations suggested that supercritical matter could experience a dramatic, rapid sea-change from gas-like properties to liquid-like ones.
Even though the atmospheric pressure of Venus at the surface is over 90 times that found on Earth today, this has not always been the case. During the earliest days of our weird sister planet's formation, the pressure may have been far greater, according to Dr. Bolmatov and his team. If those conditions had lasted for at least 100 million years, they might have resulted in the formation of supercritical carbon dioxide with liquid-like properties.
As a result, Dr. Bolmatov and his colleagues believe that it is entirely possible that geological features such as river-like beds, rift valleys, and plains on the Venusian surface are "the fingerprints of near-surface activity of liquid-like supercritical carbon dioxide." Furthermore, the team of planetary scientists found that, depending on the temperature and pressure, gas-like supercritical carbon dioxide clusters resembling soap bubbles may have also formed on our weird sister planet's strange and alien surface!
Judith E. Braffman-Miller is a writer and astronomer whose
articles have been published since 1981 in various magazines,
newspapers, and journals. Although she has written on a variety of
topics, she particularly loves writing about astronomy because it gives
her the opportunity to communicate to others the many wonders of her
field. Her first book, "Wisps, Ashes, and Smoke," will be published
soon.
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