Jan 20 1982
From The Space Library
Ames Research Center (ARC) released new findings about Venus from 30 experiments of the Pioneer Venus missions and reported that the orbiter was still returning daily information. The data were available only now because of the complexity of the missions and the large amounts of data returned, combined with the value of comparisons with Soviet data on Venus. The new data included evidence for two major currently active volcanic areas on Venus; findings that Venus had a thicker crust than Earth and was a "one-plate" planet with little plate-tectonic movement; and models of the Venus cloud system and greenhouse effect that were complete and consistent. The research also found strong new evidence of former Venus oceans on the scale of Earth's. Data indicated that the Earth would become "a virtual Venus if you stopped its rotation, removed the moon, and moved [it] slightly closer to the sun." Although Venus's atmosphere and environment might have been Earthlike during the solar system's early history, evidence of the lost oceans remained only in the ratio of deuterium to hydrogen (100 times as much deuterium relative to hydrogen on Venus as on Earth). Earlier, abundant water could have sustained life; the greenhouse effect "wiped out most existing phenomena" on Venus, replacing them with the current furnace-like environment. (ARC Release 82-1; NASA Release 82-9)
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