Venus Express space Samples Planet’s Atmosphere
October 13th 2010 01:38
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Venus Express space probe
Venus Express space probe has flown through planet Venus’s upper atmosphere.
These passes occurred over a period of many months during July-August 2008, October 2009, and February and April 2010.
The aim was to measure the density of the upper polar atmosphere, an experiment that had never been conducted before on Venus.
Venus' atmosphere extends from the surface up to an altitude of around 250 km above the planet’s surface. During April, Venus Express briefly skimmed down to 175 km above the surface.
The findings were somewhat suppressing so far the atmosphere high above the poles is a surprising 60% thinner than predicted. This could indicate that a number of very complex natural forces are at work in the atmosphere.
The atmospheric density is critical information for mission control, who are investigating the possibility of maneuvering the spacecraft even lower into the atmosphere in order to change its orbit and extend the lifetime of the mission. They need to get this mane our correct otherwise the danger of losing the probe would be the end of the exploratory mission.
The spacecraft has also registered a sharp change in density while the space craft was transiting form the day to the night side of the planet.
The Venus Express space craft was not designed to perform these measurements, however does not have instruments capable of directly sampling the atmosphere. The space craft uses, radio tracking stations on Earth who then monitor the drag on the spacecraft as it dips into the atmosphere and is decelerated by the Venusian equivalent to using air as a braking system.
image, of the 'eye of the hurricane' on Venus This picture shows a region in the venusian atmosphere about 60 km from the surface image by ESA
The current elliptical orbit takes Venus Express 24 hours to complete and loops from 250 km to 66 000 km above the planet’s surface.
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Comment by S.L.
The Political Brief
Comment by CarlCan
Astroearth
Camera Sense
Smaller remote probes can have multiple testing sensors and these probes could be designed to perform very accurate specific analyzing tasks. I think that’s where they will eventually end up doing.
Perhaps in the coming years private and corporate enterprise will fund future space missions.
Comment by S.L.
The Political Brief
I've always been a believer in private enterprise over government. Let's hope we get to find out if it applies to the space program, too.