Venus - Wikiparency

# Venus  **Microsim — three.js (Wikitube framework):** *Venus in the Solar System explorer* <div class="wt-sim" data-src="https://wikitube-3d-microsims.netlify.app/solar/Solar_System.html?obj=Venus&embed=1" data-title="Venus in the Solar System explorer"></div> *The Solar System explorer locked on this article's state (`?obj=Venus`); every object and population of the [[PORTAL_Solar_System|Solar System portal]] has its own state in the same scene.*   *Try: set the speed to 1 month/s and watch Venus lap the Sun in about seven and a half seconds while Earth needs twelve, so that Venus catches up with Earth roughly every nineteen seconds; switch the scale to true and compare its almost perfectly round orbit with the slightly off-centre paths of Earth and Mars; press o to hide the orbit lines and follow Venus swinging from one side of the Sun to the other.* **Venus** is the second planet from the [[Sun]], a rocky world almost the size of [[Earth]] that is wrapped in the densest atmosphere of any [[Terrestrial_planet|terrestrial planet]]. Its mean radius is 6,051.8 km and its mass 81.5% of Earth's, yet the surface lies under about 92 bar of [[Carbon|carbon]] dioxide at a mean temperature of 737 K, hotter than any other planetary surface in the Solar System.[^nasa-fs] A global deck of [[Sulfur|sulfuric]] acid cloud hides the ground and reflects most of the incoming sunlight, which makes Venus the brightest point of light in the night sky after the [[Moon]].[^R135][^R21] The planet has no moons and no internally generated magnetic field. It spins backwards, once every 243 Earth days, so its solar day lasts 116.75 days and its year 224.7 days.[^nasa-fs] Its surface is young, reshaped by volcanism rather than by plate tectonics, and studies disagree on whether it once held oceans.[^R101][^R4][^R5] Venus showed Galileo the phases that ruled out an Earth-centred cosmos, and it was the target of the first interplanetary flyby, the first data from another planet and the first soft landing on one.[^R160][^R172][^R177] The explorer at the top of this page is locked on Venus. It draws the planet's nearly circular [[Orbit|orbit]] at 0.723 [[Astronomical_unit|AU]] from positions computed with JPL orbital elements, and its caption notes the retrograde spin; the planet's disc is enlarged for visibility in log scale and its clouds and surface are not modelled.[^jpl-t1] ## Physical characteristics Venus is the closest match to Earth in bulk: its radius is 95% of Earth's, its mean [[Density|density]] 5,243 kg/m³ against Earth's 5,513, and its surface gravity 8.87 m/s², about 90% of Earth's.[^nasa-fs] Because it spins so slowly, the planet has no measurable flattening at the poles.[^nasa-fs] The resemblance ends at the surface. The atmosphere is 96.5% carbon dioxide and 3.5% [[Nitrogen|nitrogen]], and at 737 K and 9.2 MPa both gases are above their [[Critical_point_(thermodynamics)|critical points]], so the lowest layer behaves as a supercritical fluid rather than an ordinary gas.[^nasa-fs][^R224] ### Natural history Venus is thought to have formed in the same sequence as the other rocky planets, from dust to planetesimals, embryos and giant impacts, but the timeline is poorly constrained because so few isotopic measurements exist for it.[^R237] A 2023 study argued that the amount of nitrogen now in the atmosphere is best explained if the planet had plate tectonics during its first billion years or so, which would also have made it more hospitable.[^R4] A 2024 analysis of the gases that volcanism supplies today reached the opposite conclusion about water: the interior appears too dry ever to have filled oceans.[^R5] When the Sun becomes a red giant, some seven to eight billion years from now, Venus is expected to be engulfed.[^R239] ### Geography Magellan's radar mapped almost the whole surface in 1990–1991, and Venera landers in 1975 and 1982 photographed angular rocks and sediment at their landing sites.[^R69] About 80% of the planet is volcanic plain, most of it wrinkle-ridged.[^R72] Two elevated regions stand above the plains: Ishtar Terra in the north, about the size of Australia and carrying the Maxwell Montes, and the larger Aphrodite Terra near the equator, crossed by fractures and faults.[^R73] Surface features are named after women from history and mythology, with three exceptions named before the rule was adopted: Maxwell Montes, after [[James_Clerk_Maxwell|James Clerk Maxwell]], and Alpha and Beta Regio.[^R75][^R76] Zero longitude runs through the central peak of the crater Ariadne.[^R16] The surface carries almost a thousand impact craters, spread evenly and mostly pristine; crater counts date it to about 300–600 million years, which points to a planet-wide resurfacing episode.[^R101][^R91] Volcanic landforms are everywhere: a 2023 survey of Magellan images catalogued about 85,000 volcanoes, most of them small.[^R244] Pancake-shaped domes 20–50 km across, radiating fracture systems and ring-shaped coronae are all volcanic features without close Earth analogues.[^R74] Signs of current activity have accumulated: four transient infrared hot spots seen by Venus Express in 2008–2009 in the Ganiki Chasma rift, estimated at 800–1,100 K against a background near 740 K, and lava flows on Sif Mons and Niobe Planitia that changed between Magellan radar passes.[^R90][^R89][^R235] Sulfur dioxide above the clouds fell by a factor of ten between 1978 and 1986, a decline consistent with fading after a large eruption.[^R70][^R82] ### Internal structure With no seismic data, the interior is inferred from bulk properties. Venus is presumed to have a metallic core, a rocky mantle and a [[Crust_(geology)|crust]] like Earth's.[^R95] Radar measurements of the spin axis precession between 2006 and 2020 gave a moment of inertia implying a core of about 3,500 km radius, the first measured value.[^R10] The crust is estimated at about 40 km thick on average and 65 km at most.[^R247] Without plate tectonics to carry heat away, the planet may instead lose it in episodic bursts of resurfacing.[^R106][^R101] ### Magnetic field and core Venera 4 found in 1967 that Venus has no strong magnetic field; the weak field around it is induced where the [[Solar_wind|solar wind]] meets the ionosphere.[^R102] A dynamo needs a conducting fluid, rotation and convection, and the slow spin is thought to be sufficient; the missing ingredient is probably [[Convection|convection]], choked off if the mantle is too hot for the core to lose heat quickly.[^R106][^R105] Another proposal is that, lacking a late giant impact of the kind that formed Earth's Moon, Venus kept a stably layered core that never began to stir.[^R248] Without a magnetosphere, the solar wind strips [[Hydrogen|hydrogen]] and [[Oxygen|oxygen]] from water broken apart by ultraviolet light.[^R108] The [[Deuterium|deuterium]]-to-hydrogen ratio in the atmosphere is about 100 times that of the rest of the Solar System, the signature of a large amount of water lost to space.[^R110] ## Atmosphere and climate The atmosphere has a mass about 92 times that of Earth's and a surface density of about 65 kg/m³, some 50 times that of sea-level air on Earth.[^nasa-fs][^R224] The pressure at the ground equals that about 900 m down in Earth's oceans (derived). Carbon dioxide traps the planet's heat so effectively that the surface is hotter than Mercury's even though Venus is almost twice as far from the Sun.[^R28] At 0.723 AU the planet receives 2,601 W/m² of sunlight, 1.91 times Earth's value by the inverse-square law (derived), yet only about a tenth of it reaches the ground through the cloud deck, which reflects about 77% of the incoming light (the Bond albedo).[^nasa-fs][^R230] The [[Water|water]] that may once have existed is thought to have been lost through a runaway greenhouse, in which warming evaporated more water vapour, which in turn trapped more heat.[^R36][^R228] The clouds lie between about 45 and 70 km altitude and are made mainly of sulfuric acid droplets produced by sunlight acting on [[Sulfur|sulfur]] dioxide and water.[^R250][^R251] The upper atmosphere circulates far faster than the solid planet turns: winds at the cloud tops reach about 300 km/h and carry the clouds around the planet in roughly four days, about 60 times faster than the surface rotates, a pattern called super-rotation.[^R48][^R255] At the ground the winds are only a few kilometres per hour, but in air that dense they still move dust and pebbles.[^R45] Heat is so well shared that the surface is almost isothermal between day and night and from equator to pole, and the tiny axial tilt removes seasons.[^nasa-fs][^R52] Height is the main control: the deepest lowlands are near 750 K and the summit of Maxwell Montes about 650 K.[^R53] Radar-bright coatings on the highest peaks are thought to be a metallic "snow", possibly lead sulfide, that condenses where the air is coolest.[^R55] Whistler-mode radio waves recorded by Venus Express were interpreted as lightning, but other searches have found none and the question is unresolved.[^R60][^R56] ## Orbit and rotation Venus orbits at a mean 108.2 million km from the Sun with an eccentricity of 0.0068, the most circular planetary orbit, completing a circuit in 224.701 days.[^nasa-fs] Thirteen Venus orbits take almost exactly eight Earth years, so its appearances in Earth's sky repeat on an eight-year cycle.[^R260] Simulations suggest the eccentricity may once have been as high as 0.31.[^R111] The planet rotates in the opposite sense to its orbital motion, once every 243 days.[^nasa-fs] Combining the retrograde spin with the orbital motion gives a solar day of 1 / (1/224.70 + 1/243.02) ≈ 116.75 days (derived), so the Sun, if it could be seen through the clouds, would rise in the west and set in the east about twice per Venus year.[^nasa-fs][^R120] The spin rate is not constant: Magellan and Venus Express measurements differ by about 6.5 minutes, and radar tracking shows the day length varies by up to about 20 minutes, driven by exchange of [[Angular_momentum|angular momentum]] with the heavy atmosphere.[^R118][^R10] The present rotation is thought to be a balance between solar [[Tide|tides]] on the body, which push it towards synchronous rotation, and thermal tides raised in the atmosphere by solar heating.[^R122][^R123] A proposed resonance with Earth, suggested because each close approach falls after almost exactly five Venus solar days, has been rejected.[^R124][^R125] Venus has no natural satellites; a dedicated telescopic survey in 2009 found none.[^R126] It does share its orbit with small bodies, including the quasi-satellite 2002 VE68.[^R127] A ring of [[Interplanetary_dust_cloud|interplanetary dust]] lies along its orbit, imaged in full by the Parker Solar Probe.[^R132] ### Orbit in respect to Earth The two planets pass each other every 583.92 days on average, the synodic period, which follows from 1 / (1/224.70 − 1/365.26) (derived).[^nasa-fs] At inferior conjunction Venus comes closer to Earth than any other planet, on average 41.4 million km and at least 38.2 million km.[^nasa-fs] Averaged over time, however, [[Mercury_(planet)|Mercury]] is the planet nearest to Earth, because Venus spends much of its time on the far side of the Sun.[^R114] Venus is also a frequent gravity-assist waypoint, both for robotic trajectories to [[Jupiter]] and in studies of crewed flights to [[Mars]].[^R115][^R7] ## Observability Venus reaches an apparent magnitude of about −4.9, brighter than any star or planet, and averages −4.14.[^R135][^R20] It is brightest as a crescent about a month before or after inferior conjunction, and because, like [[Mercury_(planet)|Mercury]], it is an inner planet, it never strays more than about 47° from the Sun.[^R137] It alternates between evening and morning sky across each 584-day synodic cycle, and its brilliance makes it a frequent source of reports of unidentified flying objects.[^R138] ### Phases A telescope shows Venus go through phases like the Moon's: a small full disc near superior conjunction, a half disc at greatest elongation and a large thin crescent near inferior conjunction. When close to the Sun, sunlight scattered in its atmosphere can extend the horns of the crescent.[^R137] ### Daylight apparitions When it is bright and well separated from the Sun, Venus can be seen in a clear daytime sky without optical aid.[^R136] Edmund Halley calculated its maximum brightness in 1716, when Londoners were alarmed by its daylight appearance, and it was noticed in daylight during the inauguration of Abraham Lincoln on 4 March 1865.[^R139][^R140] ### Transits A transit happens only when inferior conjunction falls near one of the two points where the orbit of Venus crosses the [[Ecliptic|ecliptic]], in early June or early December; the pattern currently repeats in pairs eight years apart, separated by gaps of 105.5 and 121.5 years in a 243-year cycle.[^R143] Jeremiah Horrocks made the first known observation in 1639, and later transits were used to measure the [[Astronomical_unit|astronomical unit]], the purpose of James Cook's 1769 voyage to Tahiti.[^R144][^R146] The most recent pair fell in 2004 and 2012; the next will occur in December 2117 and December 2125.[^R143] ### Ashen light Observers since 1643 have reported a faint glow on the night side of the crescent. It has never been confirmed; proposed explanations range from electrical activity in the atmosphere to an illusion produced by the bright crescent next to it.[^R148] ## Observation and exploration history ### Early observation Mesopotamian sources, among them the Venus tablet of Ammisaduqa, show that the morning and evening appearances were recognised as one body in the second millennium BC.[^R150][^R149] The Greeks called the two apparitions Phosphoros and Hesperos; Pliny credited Pythagoras with identifying them as one.[^R154][^R155] ### Venus and early modern astronomy Galileo watched Venus with a telescope in 1610 and saw its full cycle of phases, including a nearly full disc, which requires it to pass behind the Sun; the observation, published in 1613, was one of the first direct contradictions of the Ptolemaic system.[^R160] [[Johannes_Kepler|Johannes Kepler]] predicted the transit of 1631, and in 1761 Mikhail Lomonosov inferred an atmosphere from the ring of light he saw around the planet's disc as it crossed onto the Sun.[^R162][^R163] ### Early 20th century advances Frank Ross's ultraviolet photographs of the 1920s showed cloud markings invisible in ordinary light.[^R168] The rotation remained unknown until radar measurements in the early 1960s found a slow, retrograde spin.[^R170] ### First missions to Venus Venera 1 flew towards Venus in 1961 but lost contact, and on 14 December 1962 Mariner 2 passed about 34,800 km from the planet and returned the first data from another planet.[^R172][^R174] Venera 4 descended through the atmosphere in 1967 and measured a gas mostly of carbon dioxide at pressures far above expectations, and on 15 December 1970 Venera 7 became the first spacecraft to transmit from the surface of another planet.[^R175][^R177] Venera 9 and 10 returned the first surface images in 1975;[^R69] the Pioneer Venus orbiter worked from 1978 to 1992; and Venera 15 and 16 radar-mapped the northern quarter of the planet in 1983–1984.[^R179][^R180] In 1985 the Vega 1 and 2 landers each released a balloon that floated about 50 km up in the middle cloud layer, returning data for some 47 hours, and between 1990 and 1994 Magellan mapped more than 99% of the surface by radar.[^nssdc-vega][^nssdc-magellan] ### Renewed exploration ESA's Venus Express studied the atmosphere from orbit from 2006 until its fuel ran out in 2014, and Japan's Akatsuki, after missing orbit insertion in 2010, entered orbit on 7 December 2015 and studied the super-rotating clouds until contact was lost in April 2024.[^R181][^nssdc-akatsuki] ### Active and planned missions [[NASA]] selected two missions in 2021: VERITAS, an orbiter to map the surface and its composition, and DAVINCI, which is to drop a probe through the atmosphere.[^nasa-veritas] ESA selected its EnVision orbiter the same year.[^esa-envision] A privately funded probe, Venus Life Finder, has been proposed to search the clouds for organic compounds.[^R279] ### Crewed mission concepts Venus flybys have been studied since the 1960s as a way to shorten or add abort options to crewed Mars trips.[^R7][^R281] Because pressure and temperature about 50 km up resemble those at Earth's surface, crewed balloons or airships in the cloud layer have also been proposed, although the acid clouds would be a serious hazard.[^R212] ## Possibility of life The surface is far too hot for life as it is known, but the cloud layers have drawn speculation at least since 1967, when Carl Sagan, dismissing the surface, pointed to the clouds as a more plausible setting.[^R203] Between about 48 and 59 km the temperature and radiation are tolerable, though water is scarce and the droplets are concentrated acid.[^R8][^R13] In 2019 a long-term study of the ultraviolet absorbers in the upper cloud found that they vary over years and affect how much sunlight the atmosphere absorbs, without identifying what they are.[^R204] In 2020 a team reported phosphine, a simple compound of [[Phosphorus|phosphorus]] and hydrogen, in the clouds, a gas they could not explain by known non-biological chemistry; reanalyses attributed the signal to sulfur dioxide or found no significant detection.[^R41][^R42][^R44] ### Planetary protection Venus is in planetary protection category II, which treats contamination by spacecraft as only a remote risk to future investigations.[^R207] The debate over possible cloud biology has prompted calls to revisit it for the atmosphere, but COSPAR concluded that the cloud layers are not habitable enough to warrant a change.[^R283] ## In culture Venus has been named after goddesses of love and fertility in many traditions. Sumerian hymns tied Inanna to the planet, and her descent to the underworld and return have been read as a reflection of its disappearance in the Sun's glare and reappearance on the other side of the sky.[^R149][^R190] The Romans named it after their own goddess of love, whom they identified with the Greek Aphrodite.[^R221] In East Asian languages it is the "metal star", following the five-element scheme of Chinese philosophy.[^R184] The Maya tracked its 584-day cycle carefully and recorded it in the Dresden Codex.[^R183] ### Modern culture The unbroken clouds let early 20th-century writers imagine a warm, swampy Venus, and the genre peaked between the 1930s and 1950s before the first probes revealed the real conditions.[^R196][^R197] ### Symbols The astronomical symbol ♀, a circle over a small cross, is of ancient Greek origin; it was later used in alchemy for [[Copper|copper]] and in biology for the female sex.[^R199][^R218] ## See also - [[Terrestrial_planet]] - [[Mercury_(planet)]] · [[Earth]] · [[Mars]] - [[Habitable_zone]] - [[Formation_and_evolution_of_the_Solar_System]] - [[Timeline_of_Solar_System_exploration]] - [[PORTAL_Solar_System|Solar System portal]] ## Notes Derived numbers use the NASA fact-sheet values: the irradiance ratio is (149.598 / 108.210)² ≈ 1.91; the solar day for a retrograde rotator is 1 / (1/224.70 + 1/243.02) ≈ 116.75 days; the synodic period is 1 / (1/224.70 − 1/365.26) ≈ 584 days; 92 bar corresponds to the weight of a column of seawater (density about 1,025 kg/m³) roughly 9.2 × 10⁶ / (1,025 × 9.81) ≈ 900 m tall. 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ISBN 978-0-521-79912-6 [^R199]: Stearn, William T. (17 August 1961). "The Male and Female Symbols of Biology". *New Scientist*, 412–413. https://books.google.com/books?id=BJ5eFU5aRecC&pg=PA413 [^R218]: Schott, G. D. (22 December 2005). "Sex symbols ancient and modern: their origins and iconography on the pedigree". *BMJ* 331, 1509–1510. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.331.7531.1509 ## Further reading - Taylor, F. W. (2014). *The Scientific Exploration of Venus*. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-107-02348-2. - Grinspoon, D. H. (1997). *Venus Revealed: A New Look Below the Clouds of Our Mysterious Twin Planet*. Addison-Wesley. ISBN 978-0-201-40655-9. ## External links - NASA Science: Venus. https://science.nasa.gov/venus/ - NASA NSSDCA Venus Fact Sheet. https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/factsheet/venusfact.html - ESA Venus Express. https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Venus_Express - NASA Goddard: transits of Venus. https://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/transit/venus0412.html ### Cartographic resources - USGS/IAU Gazetteer of Planetary Nomenclature: Venus. https://planetarynames.wr.usgs.gov/Page/VENUS/target - USGS Astrogeology: Venus maps and data. https://astrogeology.usgs.gov/search?target=venus *Article prose: Solar System portal child articles, wave 1, 2026-09-18 · row SOL-010 · strict pair pinned at revision [1374925962](https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1374925962). The sections below this block are the page's earlier material, kept in place.*  ## Microsim To Do *Claimable rows, house pattern. 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`Temperature` · `Terraforming_of_Venus` · `Terrestrial_planet` · `Tethys_(moon)` · `The_New_York_Times` · `The_Planetary_Society` · `The_Planets` · `The_Starry_Night` · `Theia_(hypothetical_planet)` · `Themis_(hypothetical_moon)` · `Thermal_inertia` · `Thermal_insulation` · `Tianwen-4` · `Tidal_force` · `Tidal_locking` · `Tide` · `Time_(magazine)` · `Timeline_of_Solar_System_exploration` · `Timeline_of_discovery_of_Solar_System_planets_and_their_moons` · `Titan_(moon)` · `Titania_(moon)` · `Trans-Neptunian_object` · `Transit_of_Mercury` · `Transit_of_Venus` · `Triton_(moon)` · `Trojan_(celestial_body)` · `Tyche_(hypothetical_planet)` · `Ultraviolet` · `Ultraviolet_photography` · `Umbriel` · `Uncrewed_spacecraft` · `Unidentified_flying_object` · `United_States` · `Universe` · `Universe_Today` · `University_College_London` · `University_of_Sydney` · `Uranus` · `Uranus_Orbiter_and_Probe` · `VERITAS_(spacecraft)` · `Vanth_(moon)` · `Vega_1` · `Vega_2` · `Vega_program` · `Venera-17` · `Venera_8` · [[Venus]] · `Venus-like_exoplanet` · `Venus_(mythology)` · `Venus_Express` · `Venus_In_Situ_Atmospheric_and_Geochemical_Explorer` · `Venus_In_Situ_Explorer` · `Venus_In_situ_Composition_Investigations` · `Venus_Life_Finder` · `Venus_Orbiter_Mission` · `Venus_Origins_Explorer` · `Venus_tablet_of_Ammisaduqa` · `Vesta_(spacecraft)` · `Vincent_van_Gogh` · `Virgil` · `Virgo_Supercluster` · `Volcanic_lightning` · `Volcanism` · `Volume` · `Vulcan_(hypothetical_planet)` · `Vulcanoid` · `Washington_University_in_St._Louis` · [[Wayback_Machine]] · `Weywot` · `William_Blake` · `William_Wordsworth` · `Xiangliu_(moon)` · `Zond_program` ## Plate !Venus plate.svg *Engraved plate: MTN / Wikitube.io original · CC BY-SA 4.0.* ## From the Real GENERATIVE library ![Animated: Venus](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/cc/Solar_system_orrery_inner_planets.gif/220px-Solar_system_orrery_inner_planets.gif) *Animated: Venus — placed from the Real G.E.N.E.R.A.T.I.V.E. course library (Geometry room). Source: Wikimedia Commons (via Wikipedia article media). [Details & license](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Solar_system_orrery_inner_planets.gif).* > Venus is the second planet from the Sun. It is a terrestrial planet and is the closest in mass and size to its orbital neighbour Earth. ([Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus))  ## Media (PD/CC)  !Gif Library/Solar System/Solar system orrery inner planets.gif *Solar_system_orrery_inner_planets.gif · Datumizer · CC BY-SA 4.0 · [source](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Solar_system_orrery_inner_planets.gif)*  > **Official MAIN — Planet 2.** Mining survey of the Space Mining In Minnesota CoE, on the Technate Expansion schema — ring **R4 Inner System**. Address: 0.72 AU from the Sun; 0.3-1.7 AU from the Centroid. Sibling surveys: the 14-body index. ## Mining Survey **Confirmed resources.** A 92-bar CO2 atmosphere — carbon and oxygen feedstock at any altitude; nitrogen (3.5%) exceeding Earth's total atmospheric nitrogen; sulfuric acid clouds (sulfur, water); surface basalts mapped by Magellan radar. **Extraction constraints.** The surface is the solar system's least minable (465 °C, 92 bar, probes survive ~2 hours) — Venus mining means ATMOSPHERIC mining from ~55 km aerostats, where conditions are the most Earth-like off Earth. **Survey status.** Magellan radar topography (1990s) is still the base map; Akatsuki cloud dynamics; DAVINCI/VERITAS/EnVision will refresh the survey. ## Coordinate Frame Planetocentric IAU (retrograde; east-positive per IAU 2000). Atlas: `Interplanetary-Atlas/Bodies/Venus` (harvest complete; coords UNVERIFIED pending Mac pass). ## Vocational-Technical Semiotics Speaks the CoE's survey sign systems — geologic map symbols (exported off-world), phase diagrams (ice/volatile stability), crystallographic symbols (mineralogy), hazard pictograms ghs (volatiles handling) — per the CoE semiotics block.  ## Semiotic Vocabulary | Term | Notation / glyph | Sign system | Meaning at this body | |------|-------------------|-------------|---------------------| | Venus symbol | U+2640 ♀ | astronomical/alchemical | feminine designation per IAU tradition | | Radar brightness | bright = rough, dark = smooth | geologic map symbols | surface roughness convention from Magellan altimetry | | IAU nomenclature — Regio | regional designation | geologic map symbols | large lowland plains on Venus (Maxwell Regio, etc.) | | IAU nomenclature — Terra | highland designation | geologic map symbols | large highland plateau on Venus (Ishtar Terra) | | IAU nomenclature — Mons | peak designation | geologic map symbols | mountain or volcano on Venus; **Maxwell Montes** (lone named exception, from Maxwell's equations) | | Retrograde rotation | curved arrow ↻, 243d⁻¹ | phase diagrams | Venus rotates backward (east-to-west) slower than its orbit | | Super-rotation | westward cloud drift, 4-day period | meteorological (unofficial) | Venus's upper atmosphere laps the planet in 4 Earth days despite 243-day surface rotation | | Pressure notation | bar, Pa, MPa | pid symbols | 92 bar surface; 0.5–1 bar at 55 km (aerostat mining altitude) | | Sulfuric acid | H₂SO₄ | hazard pictograms ghs | clouds at 45–70 km altitude; corrosive, volatile feedstock for mining | | Aerostat station-keeping | circle with mooring lines (unofficial) | hazard pictograms ghs | floating platform design for 55 km altitude mining operations; "Earth-like" pressure/temperature zone | | Magellan radar mapping | hatched surface texture | geologic map symbols | 1990–1994 synthetic-aperture radar data; still base topographic map of Venus | | CO₂ composition | 96.5% (notation: CO₂, ppm sulfur compounds) | pid symbols | carbon and oxygen feedstock; nitrogen (3.5%) feedstock exceeds Earth's total atmosphere |  ## Navigation - Space Mining In Minnesota CoE · Technate Expansion · All 14 surveys - Centers of Excellence Portal ## Wikipedia : Wikitube **Strict pair:** [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus) : [Wikitube](https://en.wikitube.io/wiki/Venus) ## Previous hub tags Tree parent: [[Oxygen]]. Legacy hubs: none. *Legacy media (later editing), kept in place under `Wikitube - Collision And Promoted Articles/Venus/`: `Venus Images` (1)* --- *Sources: 1 legacy note. Minted wave 1, 2026-07-30 (v1.6 order).*