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An infrared spectroscopy image of Venus's southern hemisphere, mosaiced from more than a thousand images taken between May 06 and Dec 07 by the VIRTIS instrument aboard the Venus Express orbiter.  (Source: ESA/VIRTIS/INAF-IASF/Obs. de Paris-LESIA)
Venus may have looked like Earth, just not for very long.

After a November 2005 launch, the European Space Agency's scientific satellite, Venus Express, reached the planet in April of the following year and settled into its working orbit shortly after in May. Since then, the orbiter has been beaming back many kinds of data about the cloud-covered planet, enabling researchers to better understand its lifecycle and past.

Venus Express left Earth with seven instruments bent on unmasking Venus and revealing to us her secrets. All seven instruments were derived from the previous projects Mars Express and Rosette. ASPERA-4 analyses neutral and ionized plasma; MAG takes magnetic field measurements; PFS uses infrared Fourier spectroscopy to take vertical pictures of the atmosphere; SPICAV also uses spectroscopy to measure atmospheric content by using sun or starlight occultation; VeRa uses radio sounding to measure atmosphere; VIRTIS maps the atmosphere and surface of the planet via spectography; and VMC images in ultraviolet and visible light ranges.

Most recently, interesting images from the VIRTIS or Visible and Infrared Thermal Imaging Spectrometer instrument have been published concerning the planet's surface that give some insight into the past it may have had. In fact, Venus Express has mapped the entire southern hemisphere of the planet using VIRTIS. These images and measurements show that it's very likely that Venus had a wet and wild surface in its early ages.

The most compelling evidence for the theory comes from the discovery of granite on the surface of what should be continents. Granite, as it turns out, is produced partly by geological activity known on Earth as plate tectonics. Basalt, a common volcanic rock, is mixed with water by one plate plunging beneath another while under water. The combination is then melted by the heat of the planet's core and spit back out as molten rock.

Large plateaus on Venus containing granite suggest that the planet's past was probably as epic as the Earth's with active volcanoes, vast oceans and destructive earthquakes. While the discovery of granite on the surface does suggest that the planet's past was active, there isn't much evidence of current volcanic activity. However, there are areas of darker rock on the VIRTIS maps which indicate that such activity may not have been gone long, or may simply not have been observed yet.

Venus Express's mission life has already been extended to December of this year, but if recent history is any indication, the orbiter will likely receive a new mission upon completion of the current.

Venus is a planet of mystery, having been cloaked from Earth's inquisitive gaze for most of mankind's operational life-span. Though many probes and landers have been sent to it in the hopes of catching a glimpse of the obscured surface, Venus Express is the first to return such complete and meaningful data. Future missions will unravel even more mysteries about Earth's sister planet, and perhaps, technological advancement willing, man will one day set foot on its hot plate surface.



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this is great news!!!
By superPC on 7/16/2009 8:18:52 AM , Rating: 2
amazing all three planet (venus, earth, mars) in the Habitable zone of our solar system have a watery past. venus and mars might harbor life in the past, if they don't, maybe with terraforming they can harbor life in the future (reminds me of that old animated series Exo Squad)!!!




RE: this is great news!!!
By FITCamaro on 7/16/2009 8:29:07 AM , Rating: 2
For all we know, Venus could still harbor primitive life.


RE: this is great news!!!
By myhipsi on 7/16/2009 9:13:48 AM , Rating: 2
It could, though highly unlikely considering the planet's surface is at a scorching 462*C, and has an atmospheric surface pressure of 92 bar. An argument can be made that earth has life in hostile places (hydrothermal vents) with high temperatures and pressures, so Venus could harbor life too, but when you take into consideration that, on earth, we are observing life after ~3.8 billion years of evolution, it isn't surprising that life is in every nook and cranny.

It would be interesting to know how Venus and Mars evolved though, as it would give us clues as to all the factors involved in creating a habitable planet, and why these two planets failed, early on in their respective evolutions, to become habitable, while earth became the mecca for life that it has become.


RE: this is great news!!!
By TMV192 on 7/16/2009 10:51:48 AM , Rating: 3
Sometimes I wonder how awesome it would have been if all these planets weren't so baron and extreme. Some compare traveling to other planets like Columbus's journey. However it's so much harder since getting resources are so hard off them. In the early 20th Century scientists thought that, at the very least, they could do parachute landings and fly planes on Mars, and that Venus (based on it's location) would be no hotter than Florida near the poles, but the more we learn about these planets, the more we get our work cut out


RE: this is great news!!!
By Samus on 7/16/2009 12:59:13 PM , Rating: 1
I like the 'mission to mars' idea where we, humans, came from mars after some shit went down there and everybody had to get the hell outa dodge.


RE: this is great news!!!
By General Disturbance on 7/16/2009 1:33:28 PM , Rating: 3
You know what's neat about that idea? Our history would have been EXACTLY the same, up to the invention of the telescope. At that point, history would start diverging. Imagine, back in the 1600's what was the primary mode of travel? Sailing ships. If Galileo had've seen and shared the sight of another planet with watery oceans and continents, the first thing that would have came to mind is: This is a place to explore with sailing ships!
I bet science and technology would have suddenly leapt forward much faster than it did, and our world would be totally different today, 100's of years ahead technologically.


RE: this is great news!!!
By lainofthewired on 7/17/2009 1:11:59 PM , Rating: 2
That would've been awesome.


RE: this is great news!!!
By Belard on 7/22/2009 7:57:42 AM , Rating: 2
Yeah... if we had another habitual planet on our system, or at least as habitual as Earth, the outlook from people would be different.

Mars is just on the edge of the "life zone" - but it is still quite a bit farther out from the earth so conditions such as its temperature is bound to happen. Perhaps there was some form of life there for a while, when Mars has more atmosphere. The Earth, after-all, was a vastly different planet hundreds of millions of years ago. Mars is a much smaller planet than Earth, its closer to the size of our moon.

The temps on mars means that terraforming or long-term settlements is not possible. Its between -128f~23f on Mars (avg -50f)... A summer on Mars is a rather cold winter here.

But if there was something like another Earth in our solar system - you BET we would be traveling back and forth by now.

I think the best bet for two planets to harbor life in a solar system is if they are binary. (Like a binary star system) - they orbit each other while going around the sun and having very much the same make-up. They would also need to be far enough apart that the gravitational pull on each other doesn't rip each other apart or crash into each other.


RE: this is great news!!!
By geddarkstorm on 7/16/2009 3:19:16 PM , Rating: 2
There's a big difference between the temperature and conditions at sea vents and those of the surface of Venus. Don't forget the incredibly acidic, and highly oxidizing environment of Venus, too ( http://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/001910... ). The very basic building blocks of life as we know it would never, ever survive those temperatures, pressures, and conditions -- that's a thermal dynamic reality (ever heard of an autoclave?). They'd be quickly oxidized and broken down into the gas parts we see in the Venusian atmosphere. Now, if the life was completely different in base from ours, or in some underground water areas, that'd be different.

For example, life on our planet that exists in "extreme" conditions (nothing compared to Venus extreme) have special protective mechanisms to cope with the damage those conditions would cause on their systems. Moreover, their systems are the same as ours otherwise, suggesting they didn't poof into existence WITHIN those extreme conditions, but adapted afterwords when the ability to develop defenses was available.


RE: this is great news!!!
By Jimbo1234 on 7/17/2009 1:43:12 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
The very basic building blocks of life as we know


Well that's why we keep learning new things everyday. If we did have such conditions on earth, would some form of life have evolved to take advantage of it? We need to stop thinking that if it doesn't exist on earth, it doesn't exist anywhere.


RE: this is great news!!!
By TSS on 7/16/2009 10:04:35 AM , Rating: 3
with ground temperatures beeing nigh 800F and pressures 90 times that of at earth's sea level, that would be very, very, very, very, very unlikely.

interestingly enough, venus's atmosphere is almost entirely made out of CO2. so if there was life, global warming killed it for sure!


RE: this is great news!!!
By therealnickdanger on 7/16/2009 10:34:49 AM , Rating: 2
I always think about those bacteria and shrimps and such that live at the mouths of geothermal vents on the ocean floor. Acidic, toxic, high pressure, and very hot, BUT bustling with LIFE! I still don't think we'll ever actually find any such life anywhere but on Earth, however.


RE: this is great news!!!
By MrPoletski on 7/21/2009 11:21:05 AM , Rating: 2
dont forget the clouds of sulphuric acid...


Curious...
By marsbound2024 on 7/16/2009 8:36:10 AM , Rating: 2
I am curious how granite still exists on the surface of Venus if Venus supposedly completely resurfaces itself every so often and indeed has a geologically young landscape? Since the surface of Venus is so young, one would think that the granite would also thus have to be fairly young as well. Nonetheless, I can't see Venus having an environment suitable for water over the last tens of millions of years. But alas, there is still very little we know about the planet, even though it is our closest planetary neighbor.




RE: Curious...
By kattanna on 7/16/2009 11:22:42 AM , Rating: 3
naked science, a nat geo channel show, did a show the other week on this very thing.

it seems that billions of years ago, there was water for those rock types to form. but when it got hot and the water evaporated into the atmosphere, since the planet has no magnetic shield, the solar winds from the sun blew out most of the water into space.

when the planet erupted, due to excessive heat they think, it only resurfaced about 80% of the planet, leaving behind those deposits of old rock to be studied.


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