6 ms·

Venus’ Ocean of Air and Clouds

72 points by crazydoggers 7y ago

basilgohar 7y ago
I cannot help but think that this provides some vindication for one of Isaac Asimov's more embarrassing[0] book titles... [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucky_Starr_and_the_Oceans_of_Venus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucky_Starr_and_the_Oceans_of_...
- TMWNN 7y ago
  Nothing embarrassing about it. Until the early 1960s, scientists (and, thus, science fiction) were split about 40/40/20 on whether Venus was mostly ocean, mostly swamp, or mostly desert.
raxxorrax 7y ago
I think Venus is one of the uglier planetary bodies but this was a fascinating read and the images are spectacular, especially that of Venus' nose on the pole. Would be interesting to get behind as to why the atmosphere is spinning that crazy and why the planet spins clockwise like Uranus.
- throwaway_law 7y ago
  >Would be interesting to get behind as to why the atmosphere is spinning that crazy Not an answer, but Venus doesn't have an internally generated magnetic field, so charged particles/solar winds interact with Venus' atmosphere. These interactions between the Solar Winds and atmosphere themselves create a magnetic field which appears different in size/shape than planets like us with internally generated magnetic fields. Again not an answer by any means, just interesting food for thought.
ur-whale 7y ago
This article really makes me wonder why mars is such a focus of space exploration right now, when Venus seems to be a much more interesting target: - closer (or so I believe, and according to [1]) - more atmosphere to do stuff with - more natural resources to collect - more energy to collect Granted the conditions are rough down there (pressure, temperature), but are they really rougher than those found on Mars. Different, granted, but harder? Also, depending where you place yourself in the atmosphere, conditions might actually not be that bad. Is landing a long lasting robot on Venus really harder than doing it on Mars? [1] https://sciencing.com/mars-venus-closer-earth-4940.html https://sciencing.com/mars-venus-closer-earth-4940.html
- jacobush 7y ago
  On Mars, you need to heat from severe arctic temperatures (and sometimes not at all, in mid summer) and you need some sort of pressure dome. (But you don't need 1 atmosphere.) On Venus you need some way to pump away a heat making lead melt. So... yeah, definitely much more harsh. We don't even have the technology for such heat pumps, even though I guess they are theoretically possible. You'd need exotic materials and a nuclear plant I assume. I the atmosphere though of Venus though, it gets very interesting. Apparently it's about 1 (Earth) atmosphere pressure at a temperature of about 20 Celsius (70 F), so we could have floating cities! (But the cities would have to be resistant to sulfuric acid and we would have to bring our own water.)
  - roywiggins 7y ago
    Probably the best bet for Venus surface exploration is some kind of high-temperature integrated circuit. There's already some work on that sort of thing for the innards of jet engines and the like.
    - jacobush 7y ago
      Agreed! I was thinking what you would need for a manned mission. But definitely, electronics operating at that temperature is very interesting and maybe not impossible. I have heard random ideas about mechanical contraptions, too. I wonder about power though. An electronic design could maybe run on some sort of non-rechargeable battery which could deal with the temperature. But if you wanted serious power, a molten-salt reactor would be very interesting. It would I guess "only" be extremely expensive, but maybe not impossible. The interesting thing is that you basically don't need any safety because the reactor is inert and not radiating until you start it. All in all though, I think blimps at various depths are more practical.
    - Robotbeat 7y ago
      Yup. I did some work on that for a Venus lander when I was an intern, which is published here: https://ntrs.nasa.gov/search.jsp?R=20150002090 https://ntrs.nasa.gov/search.jsp?R=20150002090

72 points by crazydoggers 7y ago

I cannot help but think that this provides some vindication for one of Isaac Asimov's more embarrassing[0] book titles... [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucky_Starr_and_the_Oceans_of_Venus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucky_Starr_and_the_Oceans_of_...

TMWNN 7y ago
Nothing embarrassing about it. Until the early 1960s, scientists (and, thus, science fiction) were split about 40/40/20 on whether Venus was mostly ocean, mostly swamp, or mostly desert.

raxxorrax 7y ago

I think Venus is one of the uglier planetary bodies but this was a fascinating read and the images are spectacular, especially that of Venus' nose on the pole. Would be interesting to get behind as to why the atmosphere is spinning that crazy and why the planet spins clockwise like Uranus.

throwaway_law 7y ago
>Would be interesting to get behind as to why the atmosphere is spinning that crazy Not an answer, but Venus doesn't have an internally generated magnetic field, so charged particles/solar winds interact with Venus' atmosphere. These interactions between the Solar Winds and atmosphere themselves create a magnetic field which appears different in size/shape than planets like us with internally generated magnetic fields. Again not an answer by any means, just interesting food for thought.

ur-whale 7y ago

This article really makes me wonder why mars is such a focus of space exploration right now, when Venus seems to be a much more interesting target: - closer (or so I believe, and according to [1]) - more atmosphere to do stuff with - more natural resources to collect - more energy to collect Granted the conditions are rough down there (pressure, temperature), but are they really rougher than those found on Mars. Different, granted, but harder? Also, depending where you place yourself in the atmosphere, conditions might actually not be that bad. Is landing a long lasting robot on Venus really harder than doing it on Mars? [1] https://sciencing.com/mars-venus-closer-earth-4940.html https://sciencing.com/mars-venus-closer-earth-4940.html

jacobush 7y ago
On Mars, you need to heat from severe arctic temperatures (and sometimes not at all, in mid summer) and you need some sort of pressure dome. (But you don't need 1 atmosphere.) On Venus you need some way to pump away a heat making lead melt. So... yeah, definitely much more harsh. We don't even have the technology for such heat pumps, even though I guess they are theoretically possible. You'd need exotic materials and a nuclear plant I assume. I the atmosphere though of Venus though, it gets very interesting. Apparently it's about 1 (Earth) atmosphere pressure at a temperature of about 20 Celsius (70 F), so we could have floating cities! (But the cities would have to be resistant to sulfuric acid and we would have to bring our own water.)
- roywiggins 7y ago
  Probably the best bet for Venus surface exploration is some kind of high-temperature integrated circuit. There's already some work on that sort of thing for the innards of jet engines and the like.
  - jacobush 7y ago
    Agreed! I was thinking what you would need for a manned mission. But definitely, electronics operating at that temperature is very interesting and maybe not impossible. I have heard random ideas about mechanical contraptions, too. I wonder about power though. An electronic design could maybe run on some sort of non-rechargeable battery which could deal with the temperature. But if you wanted serious power, a molten-salt reactor would be very interesting. It would I guess "only" be extremely expensive, but maybe not impossible. The interesting thing is that you basically don't need any safety because the reactor is inert and not radiating until you start it. All in all though, I think blimps at various depths are more practical.
  - Robotbeat 7y ago
    Yup. I did some work on that for a Venus lander when I was an intern, which is published here: https://ntrs.nasa.gov/search.jsp?R=20150002090 https://ntrs.nasa.gov/search.jsp?R=20150002090