Planet Venus

Venus is an inner, or telluric, planet; the second from the Sun. It is the third brightest object in the sky, after the Sun and the Moon. It is of similar size to the Earth and, according to observations, does not have a magnetic field. Venus rotates very slowly in a retrograde direction. The surface temperature is 470°C, due to an extreme greenhouse effect. The planet is completely surrounded by clouds composed of sulphuric acid.

Venus has long been considered Earth’s twin sister.

Venus, backwards rotation and orbital period

Venus rotates around the sun in an elliptic orbit that is the most circular of any of the planets.

During the observation of the transit of Venus of 1761, the astronomer M. V. Lomonosov reported the presence of a halo around Venus.

Venus, water evaporation and greenhouse effect

Just like the Earth, Venus used to have large amounts of water. In fact, this water came from volcanism. However, it has been completely evaporated...

Venus clouds, composition and observation

In the 1960’s Venus’ clouds were first studied by spectroscopy and polarization

Venus, super rotation of the cloud layer

Venus is dominated by the rapid rotation of the zone centred on the cloud layer, which rotates in 4 Earth days, much faster than the planet, whose rotation period is 243 days. Both rotations are in a retrograde direction.

it should be noted that the frequent sulphuric acid rain showers on Venus never reach the surface of the planet.

Volcanoes on Venus, distribution and size

Venus was very volcanically active 200 to 500 million years ago.

Venus surface, fairly flat but varied terrain

The only way to penetrate Venus’ cloud layer is with radar, bouncing it back off the surface from an orbiting probe or even from the Earth.