Venus Unveiled
Spacecraft finds Earthy features on sister planet
By Nadia Drake
Like many siblings, Venus and Earth bear a familial resemblance. Venus is similar to Earth in size, composition and gravitational pull. But some peculiar quirks, from sulfuric acid clouds to swirling polar vortices, make Venus a twisted sister indeed.
New results from the European Space Agency’s Venus Express spacecraft, which has been orbiting the cloud-shrouded planet since 2006, suggest that beneath the acidic cloak lies an extreme world that provides an important point of comparison for understanding Earth’s evolution.
“The more we actually get results from Venus, the more we see how important it is to study Venus if we want to learn more about the Earth and planetary systems in general,” says Venus Express project scientist Håkan Svedhem, who works for the European Space Agency out of Noordwijk, the Netherlands.