The stunning images captured by NASA’s Parker Solar Probe have provided the first glimpse of the scorching red surface of Venus, revealing continents, plains, and plateaus on this harsh volcanic world. These images may hold clues to the mysterious past of Venus.
Observing beneath the dense, toxic clouds of Venus with the Wide-Field Imager for Parker Solar Probe (WISPR), NASA scientists discovered a series of geological features illuminated by the faint light of Venus’s nighttime surface, along with a glowing halo of oxygen in the planet’s atmosphere.
These groundbreaking images, taken during the Parker Solar Probe’s fourth flyby of Venus on its way to the Sun, will provide scientists with valuable insights into the geology and mineralogy of this searing planet, while potentially revealing why Venus became so inhospitable while life on Earth thrived.
NASA scientists announced this new analysis on February 9 in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.
The surfaces of Venus captured by NASA’s Parker Probe.
“Venus is the third brightest object in the sky, but until recently we haven’t had much information about its surface because our view of it has been blocked by a thick atmosphere. Now, we can finally see the visible surface for the first time from space,” said the lead author of the study, Brian Wood, a physicist at the Naval Research Laboratory in Washington.
The surface of Venus has been imaged before, but this is the first time it has been captured in light visible to the human eye. The planet is shrouded in a dense, toxic layer of sulfuric acid and carbon dioxide, which prevents most light from escaping.
The WISPR instrument on the Parker Probe was designed to study the Sun’s atmosphere and solar wind, but its sensitivity allowed it to capture the faint light of this planet.
During the day, the red light of Venus is drowned out by sunlight. However, flying at night allowed the probe to detect the planet’s gentle glow and the stunning geographical features on its surface.
As WISPR detected wavelengths between visible and infrared spectra, it also enabled scientists to estimate the surface temperature of Venus. It is approximately 462 degrees Celsius, making it the hottest planet in our solar system, even at night.
Wood stated, “The surface of Venus, even at night, is around 860 degrees Celsius. It’s so hot that the rocky surface of Venus glows, similar to a piece of iron pulled from a forge.”
Scientists do not know if Venus has always been as barren as it is today, and previous studies suggested that the planet may have contained water and possibly life before it was engulfed by a greenhouse gas fog.
The Parker Probe will continue its exploration of Venus in November 2024. NASA’s Veritas and Da Vinci missions will expand the U.S. space agency’s knowledge of this planet’s surface by sending an orbiter and an atmospheric probe to it.
These missions are expected to launch around mid-2028 to 2030. The European Space Agency will also send its own orbiter, EnVision, to scan the planet’s surface.
These projects could unveil secrets about Venus’s past and may even serve as a chilling warning for one of the possible futures on Earth.
