Why not a lander on Venus?

[634449]

I wunder why Nasa takes so much interest in Mars, rather than Venus. Venus is such a mysterie, even in 2005 we don't have a clue how the surface must look like. The poor Russian pictures do not give a good view of the planets' surface. <br /><br />Does anyone know if Nasa of Esa is scheduling a Rover mission to Venus?

 

[heyo]

Heck, I'm game for it. The few picture the Russians took were a tantalizing tease. And that was done when I was about 1 or 2 years old, I know we can do much better now. The Veneras lasted I think up to a maximum of about 2 hours, which ain't bad considering the fact that (a) the heat and pressure, around 850 F and about 90 atmospheres if my memory serves me, and (b) those things were built and launched in the 70's.<br /><br />I think we could build a robust package, possibly liquid nitrogen cooled, that would last for a while.<br /><br />I also think a baloon would work well at Venus, with an atmosphereic and meteorological package, as well as a camera that can be lowered on a really long cable with a mini radar altimiter on the camera end to keep it from being dragged on the ground.<br /><br />You'd have no guidance, but you'd circle the planet in less than 10 hours and you get get an assorted photograph collection from all the way around the planet pretty quick.<br /><br />When do we start? Count me in. <br /><br />Heyo

 

[634449]

They also had an idea about sending Earth bacteria into the Venus' atmosphere, robust bacteria that could harvest the aboundunce of CO2, and spell out the O2. This will result in clearing out the atmosphere off its CO2, and the surface would cool down sufficient to settle down on Venus in a few centuries. <br /><br />But, a rover would be a good start. <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" /><br /><br />Ps. sorry for my poor English [I am from the Netherlands by the way]

 

[heyo]

Actually, your English is pretty good, my friend.<br /><br />How much bacteria do you think it would take to clear out the atmosphere in a reasonable amount of time, say, 50 to 100 years?<br /><br />I have heard varying opinions on terraforming planets, some believe it can be done in the not too distant future, others believe that the scale of an entire planet is just much larger than most people realize and making changes on that scale would be extremely difficult.<br /><br />Certainly, it's not impossible I don't think...<br /><br />Heyo

 

[Leovinus]

I wonder if such bacteria would later cause a health risk to people. One would have to expect mutations to occur. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[heyo]

It all depends on the properties of the bacteria. You could have bacteria that only thrive in the high CO2 environment, and die out as the CO2 levels drop, oxygen increases, and it could be self limiting. The more CO2, the more you'd need the bacteria, the more you'd have them... the less CO2, the less you need them, the less you have them....<br /><br />Heyo

 

[thalion]

I've been itching for another mission to Venus--landers in particular--for a long time. Three relatively simple probes with nothing more than an APXS, GCMS, seismometer, met station, and panoramic camera could expand our knowledge of the planet by leaps and bounds, even if they were short-lived.<br /><br />By the way, I think the liquid nitrogen coolant idea is really cool. If it were onboard, there would probably have to be some kind of vent for it to escape as it heated up, and that might contaminate the gas readings. If it were outside the lander though, and part of the bus, then the lander wouldn't last nearly as long. It's a definite trade-off.<br /><br />In any event, I've heard of no plans by NASA to visit Venus with any mission. Fortunately, ESA is well into the planning stages of Venus Express, but that will be an orbiter only, with a focus on atmospheric science. To be fair though, MESSENGER will fly by Venus a couple of times on its way to Mercury, which should give us some sweet images.

 

[gregoire]

Donald Mitchell has done a lot of work on the original surface images of Venus. For those who haven't seen them they're definitely worth a look.<br /><br />http://www.mentallandscape.com/V_DigitalImages.htm

 

[peacekeeper]

<blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr /><p>I wunder why Nasa takes so much interest in Mars, rather than Venus.<p><hr /></p></p></blockquote><br />Well, for one thing we don't yet have the technology to overcome Venus' intense temperature. Sure, in a decade or two we might have been able to figure out a way to shield machines from it. But when talking about the exploration of space, sending out a buch of machines to do the job will never be nowhere near as exiting as humans doing it. And while humans cannot yet survive the Venusian atmosphere, Mars is a relatively easy place to live on. Hence, it is only natural to concentrate on Mars for now, and wait with the exploration of Venus till we have a good foothold on Mars, and have the technology to discover the hot planet first hand.

 

[5stone10]

<font color="yellow">When do we start? Count me in. <br /><br />Heyo</font><br /><br /><br />Right after you come up with the scratch !!<br /><img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" />

 

[5stone10]

Those actually are nice images !

 

[glutomoto]

Thank you 634449 for bringing up one of my favorite subjects. I first read about it in an article by Larry Niven. It kind of seems crazy when you first think about it, as Heyo wondered it would probably take many many kilos of bacteria to accomplish the task. Or would it only take a little bit, after all if the choosen bacteria actually found a way to thrive, then life might win out. There are lots of people who will say that it is not humanly possible for us to alter venus's climate, yet more and more people believe we are altering earths climate. Besides if it works it will be the blue-green algae that alters the climate. As for the mention of possible harmful mutations, by Levonius; Who can say ? We have adapted to mutations of the earthly types so why not the venusiun types.<br /><br />Re: What temperatures can blue-green algae endure ?<br /><br /><br />Nuclear Winter on Venus<br /><br /><br />Early cyanobacterial fossil record: preservation, palaeoenvironments and identification<br /><br /><br />Examples of Stromatolites in the Fossil Record<br /><br /><br /><img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[heyo]

<i>When do we start? Count me in. <br /><br />Heyo <br /><br /><br />Right after you come up with the scratch !! </i><br /><br /><br /><br />Soon as I get my income tax refund. Just you wait, pal.<br /><br />;-)<br /><br />Hey... how did you get that smiley in your post?<br /><br />Heyo<br />

 

[crono21]

Not to mention arent their some extreme storms in the planets atmosphere.. Ive heard about high winds, and even lightning type phenominon. please correct me if im wrong though.. But anyway, im surprised they were able to land those probes at all.. It seems like it would be too violent an atmosphere to pull it off.

 

[newtonian]

Crono21- On the surface of Venus there is very little wind at all, only a few kilometers per hour.<br /><br />However, at cloud deck they are 400 kilometers per hour!

 

[newtonian]

Glutomoto - Did you know earth once had a thick CO2 atmosphere like Venus? <br /><br />However, most was removed by the geologic carbon cycle and now is locked in earth's vast crustal deposits of carbonates.<br /><br />That removal required liquid water, btw.<br /><br />The problem is that at Venus' high tempetature, carbonates would release their CO2!<br /><br />And, of course, water cannot be liquid at 750C!<br /><br />It both serves as a warning to not pollute our earth, but also awe at how delicately balanced earth's atmosphere is for life, and especially for human life!

 

[newtonian]

634449- Actually there have been many probes and spacecrafts to Venus. <br /><br />You all, remember Venera?<br /><br />Note the following report:<br /><br />"Since 1962, Venus has been explored by a variety of Mariner and Pioneer-Venus probes as well as by numerous Soviet Venera craft.<br /><br />For mapping, however, the best results have come from the space probe Magellan, the Venus radar mapper managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. It was launched from the space shuttle Atlantis May 4, 1989. This remarkable craft, Magellan, took 15 months to reach Venus, where it now orbits the planet every three hours and 15 minutes as it takes its radar images and transmits them back to earth. Stuart J. Goldman, writing in Sky & Telescope, says: "Calling the product of the Magellan spacecraft's mission phenomenal is making a gross understatement. . . . This robotic surveyor mapped 84 percent of an entire planet to a resolution of a football stadium during its first 8 months in orbit. . . . The quantity of data Magellan has beamed back to eager scientists has been unprecedented. By the beginning of 1992 the spacecraft had sent 2.8 trillion bits of information. This is three times the imaging data from all previous planetary spacecraft combined."<br /><br />Here is a case where the combination of a manned shuttle and a robot has produced incredible results. The benefit? Greater knowledge of our solar system. And all of this at a relatively low cost, since the Magellan has been to some extent a spare-parts project, using many leftovers from the Voyager, Galileo, and Mariner probes."- "Awake!," 9/8/92, pp. 7,8

 

[glutomoto]

Hi Newtonian,<br /> yes i know that the blue-green algae thing won't work to change venus, IIRC the Larry Niven article was written a few years before they really knew how extreme venus is. darn it.<br /><br /> so i guess that i will have to put it to rest now, but I may have to reference this, and other threads, when the next person brings up going to venus.<br /><br /><img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[newtonian]

Glutomoto - Hi back!<br /><br />What amazes me is how earth was terraformed from a similar start as Venus - noting especially the very thick CO2 atmosphere!<br /><br />And I also am trying to discern how many condensation catastrophes (water) earth had in the past as the crust reached the lower boiling points under the lower atmospheric pressure.....<br />And did algae play a part in terraforming earth?

 

[glutomoto]

Re: did algae play a part in terraforming earth?<br /><br /><hr />Stromatolite, Transvaal Supergroup, 2500 million years old, Barberton Mountains, Transvaal, South Africa<br />This stromatolite developed as part of an enormous 2500 million-year-old carbonate platform complex that included extensive reef, forereef and backreef components. This platform complex reveals that, despite the absence of corals or other multicellular reef-forming organisms, these ancient stromatolitic reefs resembled their modern counterparts in virtually all other aspects<hr /><br /><br />I guess that 2500 million years ago terra was rather well formed, but could those early stromatolites have helped change the gas balance thus making it easier for the next life forms to get their start.<br /><br /><img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" /><br /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[newtonian]

Yes- there is also a biological carbon cycle that has fixed CO2 into earth's crust in many forms, notably hydrocarbons.<br /><br />I will research algae and get back to you - much later as I have a busy day!