Discovering the Extreme Environment and Unique Characteristics of Venus: Earth’s Twin Planet

KOMPAS.com – Venus, the second planet from the sun, is the hottest and brightest planet in the solar system.

Venus is named after the Roman goddess of love and beauty. This may be because Venus shines the brightest of the five planets known to ancient astronomers.

Further observations of Venus revealed a very extreme environment. This makes Venus a very difficult planet to observe up close because spacecraft cannot stay on its surface for long.

Earth’s twin planet

According to Space, Venus and Earth are so similar in size, density, and location relative to the sun that these two planets are called twins.

Also read: Why Does Venus Look So Bright From Earth?

The similarities are important because Venus did not evolve to be Earth-like for reasons unknown to scientists.

It is possible that Venus was more Earth-like in the past, with habitable surface temperatures and oceans of water perhaps as deep as 300 m. However, over time, the history of these planets changed.

There are major differences between modern Earth and Venus. First, Venus receives about twice as much energy from the sun as Earth does, so it naturally gets hotter.

Venus’ atmosphere is predominantly CO2 and is 90 times thicker than Earth’s atmosphere. This is an important distinction that reflects a possible post-formation history.

Venus has very thick clouds and is surrounded by mid-level clouds made of droplets of sulfuric acid (aerosol) and other gases that have not been well measured.

Also read: Can Volcanoes on the Planet Venus Erupt?

Venus also has a slow rotation about Earth. As a result, a solar day on Venus is longer than the time it takes (a Venusian year) to go around the sun, and even rotates backwards relative to the other planets.

Its rotation makes Venus a very unique planet, compared to Earth which has 24 hours a day and 365.25 days a year.

Thus, Venus could be an ideal example of a terrestrial-sized planet that loses its “habitable” criteria over time due to various factors.

Other facts about the Planet Venus

Here are other interesting facts about the planet Venus:

Also read: Why is the planet Venus so hot?

1. Venus is the hottest planet in the solar system

Venus isn’t the closest planet to the Sun, but its dense atmosphere traps heat in a version of the greenhouse effect that warms Earth.

As a result, the temperature on Venus reaches 471 degrees Celsius. This is more than hot enough to melt lead.

2. The atmosphere of the planet Venus is very hot

With very high temperatures, Venus has an unusually hot atmosphere, consisting mostly of carbon dioxide with clouds of sulfuric acid and only a small amount of water.

The atmosphere of the planet Venus is also heavier than other planets, causing the surface pressure to be 90 times greater than the pressure on Earth.

As an illustration, the pressure on Venus is similar to that at a depth of 1,000 meters in the ocean.

Also read: How Many Volcanoes Are on the Planet Venus?

3. The planet Venus has unique surface features

Venus has a number of surface features unlike anything on Earth. For example, Venus has a corona or crown, which is a ring-like structure that is between 155 and 2100 km wide.

Scientists believe Venus’ corona formed when hot material under the planet’s crust rose up, bending the planet’s surface.

Venus also has tesserae or elevated areas where mountains and valleys form in different directions.

4. Venus rotates in the opposite direction

Viewed from above, Venus rotates on its axis in the opposite direction to most planets.

This means that the sun on Venus appears to rise in the west and set in the east, unlike what happens on Earth.

Get selected news updates and breaking news every day from Kompas.com. Let’s join the Telegram group “Kompas.com News Update”, how to click the link https://t.me/kompascomupdate, then join. You must first install the Telegram application on your cellphone.

2023-07-27 12:30:00
#Venus #hottest #planet #nicknamed #Earths #twin #Kompas.com