Atmospheric sample retrieval—not from the surface—seems doable. > "90x Earth's atmospheric pressure and 450°C" — becomes Earth-like conditions at higher altitu

Atmospheric sample retrieval—not from the surface—seems doable. > "90x Earth's atmospheric pressure and 450°C" — becomes Earth-like conditions at higher altitude > "while sulfuric acid clouds would rapidly degrade balloon materials" — Teflon coatings are a solved problem; JPL did coupon tests[0] > "The energy requirements for escape velocity from Venus are also substantially higher than Mars" — True, but you'd only need to launch a tiny, dumb payload into orbit, to rendezvous with the return craft. Like Apollo, sample returns aren't one monolithic spacecraft that does the full round-trip; think the Apollo Lunar Ascent Module, but, for ants [0] https://sci-hub.se/10.1016/j.asr.2007.03.017 https://sci-hub.se/10.1016/j.asr.2007.03.017 ("Prototype design and testing of a Venus long duration, high altitude balloon") > "Although the expected sulfuric acid concentration at Venus is expected to be in the range of 75–85%, tests were conducted up to 96% to understand our design margin. The material itself was found to be unaffected by prolonged exposure to all concentrations of sulfuric acid up to a temperature of 70 °C. Adhesively taped seam samples did show some discoloration at the tape edges, but there was no evidence of acid penetration into the joint using blotter paper on the inside surface. This test confirmed that the cover tape adhesive was indeed resistant to sulfuric acid as predicted and can support a long duration balloon mission at Venus." edit: I totally forgot—the Soviets already demonstrated that, in the 70's: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vega_program#Balloon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vega_program#Balloon