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Venus, Earth Mars
Venus, Earth Mars
Venus and Earth are similar in size, mass, density, composition, and distance from the sun. There, however, is where the similarities
end.
Venus is covered by a thick, rapidly spinning atmosphere, creating a scorched world with temperatures hot enough to melt lead and a
surface pressure 90 times that of Earth. Because of its proximity to Earth and the way its clouds reflect sunlight, Venus appears to be
the brightest planet in the sky.
Like Mercury, Venus can be seen periodically passing across the face of the sun. These transits occur in pairs, with more than a
century separating each pair. Since the telescope was invented, transits have been observed in 1631, 1639; 1761, 1769; and 1874,
1882. On June 8, 2004, astronomers worldwide saw the tiny dot of Venus crawl across the sun; the second in this pair of early 21st-
century transits will occur June 6, 2012.
Toxic Atmosphere
Venus's atmosphere consists mainly of carbon dioxide, with clouds of sulfuric acid droplets. Only trace amounts of water have been
detected in the atmosphere. The thick atmosphere traps the sun's heat, resulting in surface temperatures over 880 degrees Fahrenheit
(470 degrees Celsius). Probes that have landed on Venus have not survived more than a few hours before being destroyed by the
incredibly high temperatures.
The Venusian year (orbital period) is about 225 Earth days long, while the planet's rotation period is 243 Earth days, making a Venus
day about 117 Earth days long. Venus rotates retrograde (east to west) compared with Earth's prograde (west to east) rotation. Seen
from Venus, the sun would rise in the west and set in the east. As Venus moves forward in its solar orbit while slowly rotating
"backwards" on its axis, the cloud-level atmosphere zips around the planet in the opposite direction from the rotation every four Earth
days, driven by constant hurricane-force winds. How this atmospheric "super rotation" forms and is maintained continues to be a topic
of scientific investigation.
About 90 percent of the surface of Venus appears to be recently solidified basalt lava; it is thought that the planet was completely
resurfaced by volcanic activity 300 million to 500 million years ago.
Sulfur compounds, possibly attributable to volcanic activity, are abundant in Venus's clouds. The corrosive chemistry and dense,
moving atmosphere cause significant surface weathering and erosion. Radar images of the surface show wind streaks and sand
dunes. Craters smaller than 0.9 to 1.2 miles (1.5 to 2 kilometers) across do not exist on Venus, because small meteors burn up in the
dense atmosphere before they can reach the surface.
Geological Features
More than a thousand volcanoes or volcanic centers larger than 12 miles (20 kilometers) in diameter dot the surface of Venus. Volcanic
flows have produced long, sinuous channels extending for hundreds of kilometers.
Venus has two large highland areas: Ishtar Terra, about the size of Australia, in the north polar region, and Aphrodite Terra, about the
size of South America, straddling the equator and extending for almost 6,000 miles (10,000 kilometers). Maxwell Montes, the highest
mountain on Venus and comparable to Mount Everest on Earth, is at the eastern edge of Ishtar Terra.
Venus has an iron core about 1,200 miles (3,000 kilometers) in radius. Venus has no global magnetic field; though its core iron content
is similar to that of Earth, Venus rotates too slowly to generate the type of magnetic field that Earth has.
Earth
Earth, our home, is the third planet from the sun. It is the only planet known to
have an atmosphere containing free oxygen, oceans of liquid water on its surface,
and, of course, life.
Earth is the fifth largest of the planets in the solar system — smaller than the
four gas giants,Jupiter, Saturn, UranusandNeptune, but larger than the three other rocky
planets,Mercury, Marsand Venus.
Earth has a diameter of roughly 8,000 miles (13,000 kilometers), and is round
because gravity pulls matter into a ball, although it is not perfectly round, instead
being more of an "oblate spheroid" whose spin causes it to be squashed at its
poles and swollen at the equator.
Earth's orbit is not a perfect circle, but is rather an oval-shaped ellipse, like that
of the orbits of all the other planets. Earth is a bit closer to the sun in early
January and farther away in July, although this variation has a much smaller
effect than the heating and cooling caused by the tilt of Earth's axis. Earth
happens to lie within the so-called "Goldilocks zone" around its star, where
temperatures are just right to maintain liquid water on its surface.
Most of the fossils seen in Paleozoic rocks are invertebrate animals lacking
backbones, such as corals, mollusks and trilobites. Fish are first found about 450
million years ago, while amphibians appear roughly 380 million years ago. By 300
million years ago, large forests and swamps covered the land, and the earliest
fossils of reptiles appear during this period as well.
The Mesozoic saw the ascendence of dinosaurs, although mammals also appear in the
fossil record about 200 million years ago. During this time, flowering plants
became the dominant plant group and continue to be so today.
The Cenozoic began about 65 million years ago with the end of the age of
dinosaurs, which many scientists think was caused by a cosmic impact.
Mammals survived to become the dominant land animals of today.
Above the troposphere, some 30 miles (48 km) above the Earth's surface, is the
stratosphere. The still air of the stratosphere contains the ozone layer, which was
created when ultraviolet light caused trios of oxygen atoms to bind together into
ozone molecules. Ozone prevents most of the sun's harmful ultraviolet radiation
from reaching Earth's surface.
Water vapor, carbon dioxide and other gases in the atmosphere trap heat from
the sun, warming Earth. Without this so-called "greenhouse effect," Earth would
probably be too cold for life to exist, although a runaway greenhouse effect led to
the hellish conditions now seen on Venus.
Earth-orbiting satellites have shown that the upper atmosphere actually expands
during the day and contracts at night due to heating and cooling.
Magnetic field
Earth's magnetic field is generated by currents flowing in Earth's outer core. The
magnetic poles are always on the move, with the magnetic North Pole recently
accelerating its northward motion to 24 miles (40 km) annually, likely exiting
North America and reaching Siberia in a few decades.
Earth's magnetic field is changing in other ways, too — globally, the magnetic
field has weakened 10 percent since the 19th century, according to NASA.These changes
are mild compared to what Earth's magnetic field has done in the past —
sometimes the field completely flips, with the north and the south poles swapping
places.
When charged particles from the sun get trapped in Earth's magnetic field, they
smash into air molecules above the magnetic poles, causing them to glow, a
phenomenon known as the aurorae, the northern and southern lights.
Chemical composition
Oxygen is the most abundant element in rocks in Earth's crust, composing roughly
47 percent of the weight of all rock. The second most abundant element
is silicon at 27 percent, followed by aluminum at 8 percent, iron at 5
percent, calcium at 4 percent, and sodium, potassium, and magnesium at about 2
percent each.
Earth's core consists mostly of iron and nickel and potentially smaller amounts of
lighter elements such as sulfur and oxygen. The mantle is made of iron and
magnesium-rich silicate rocks. (The combination of silicon and oxygen is known
as silica, and minerals that contain silica are known as silicate minerals.)
Internal structure
Earth's core is about 4,400 miles (7,100 km) wide, slightly larger than half the
Earth's diameter and roughly the size of Mars. The outermost 1,400 miles (2,250
km) of the core are liquid, while the inner core — about four-fifths as big as
Earth's moon at some 1,600 miles (2,600 km) in diameter — is solid.
Above the core is Earth's mantle, which is about 1,800 miles (2,900 km) thick.
The mantle is not completely stiff, but can flow slowly. Earth's crust floats on the
mantle much as a wood floats on water, and the slow motion of rock in the
mantle shuffles continents around and causes earthquakes, volcanoes, and the
formation of mountain ranges.
Above the mantle, Earth has two kinds of crust. The dry land of the continents
consists mostly of granite and other light silicate minerals, while the ocean floors
are made up mostly of a dark, dense volcanic rock called basalt. Continental
crust averages some 25 miles (40 km) thick, although it can be thinner or thicker
in some areas. Oceanic crust is usually only about 5 miles (8 km) thick. Water fills
in low areas of the basalt crust to form the world's oceans. Earth has more than
enough water to completely fill the ocean basins, and the rest of it spreads onto
edges of the continents, areas known as the continental shelf.
Earth gets warmer toward its core. At the bottom of the continental crust,
temperatures reach about 1,800 degrees F (1,000 degrees C), increasing about 3
degrees F per mile (1 degree C per kilometer) below the crust. Geologists think
the temperature of Earth's outer core is about 6,700 to 7,800 degrees F (3,700 to
4,300 degrees C), and the inner core may reach 12,600 degrees F (7,000 degrees
C), hotter than the surface of the sun. Only the enormous pressures found at the
super-hot inner core keep it solid.
Recent exoplanet surveys such as NASA’s Kepler mission suggest that Earth-size
planets are common throughout the Milky Way galaxy. Nearly a fourth of sun-like
stars observed by Kepler have potentially habitable Earth-size planets.
Earth's moon
Earth's moon is 2,159 miles (3,474 km) wide, about one-fourth of Earth's diameter.
Earth has one moon, while Mercury and Venus have none and all the other planets
in our solar system have two or more.
The leading explanation for how the moon formed was that a giant impact knocked off
the raw ingredients for the moon off the primitive molten Earth and into orbit.
Scientists have suggested the impactor was roughly 10 percent the mass of
Earth, about the size of Mars.
Species overview
Earth is the only planet in the universe known to possess life. There are several
million known species of life, ranging from the bottom of the deepest ocean to a
few miles into the atmosphere, and scientists think far more remain to be
discovered. Scientists figure there are between 5 million and 100 millionspecies on
Earth, but science has only identified about 2 million of them.
Earth is the only body in the solar system known to host life, although scientists
suspect that other candidates — such as Saturn’s moon Titan or Jupiter’s moon
Europa — have the potential to house primitive living creatures. Scientists have
yet to precisely nail down exactly how complex life rapidly evolved on Earth from
more primitive ancestors. One solution suggests that life first evolved on the
nearby planet Mars, once a habitable planet, then traveled to Earth
on meteorites hurled from the Red Planet.
The large amount of science fiction written during the twentieth century was a direct
outgrowth of the belief that Mars possessed life. From little green men to death rays,
Martians were the focus of many television and radio programs, comic books, movies, and
novels.
Although the discovery of Martian life in the eighteenth century eventually proved to be
false, Mars is nonetheless the planet most hospitable for life other than the Earth. As
such, recent planetary missions have tried to determine if even the most basic of life exists
on the planet’s surface. The Viking mission in the 1970s conducted experiments on the
Martian soil in hopes of detecting microorganisms. While it was initially believed that the
formation of compounds during the experiments were a result of biological agents, it has
since been determined that these compounds can be created without biological
mechanisms.
Even though the results lean toward the absence of life on Mars, scientists have
speculated that conditions are right for life to exist beneath the planet’s surface. Future
planetary missions scheduled to test the possibility of past and present life include
the Mars Science Laboratory and ExoMars missions.
ATMOSPHERE
The composition of Mars’ atmosphere is extremely similar to Venus’, one of the least
hospitable atmospheres in all of the Solar System. The main component in both
atmospheres is carbon dioxide (95% for Mars, 97% for Venus), yet a runaway greenhouse
effect has taken hold of Venus, producing temperatures in excess of 480° C, while
temperatures on Mars never exceed 20° C. Thus, something other than the composition is
at work. The huge difference lies in the density of the two atmospheres. Whereas Venus’
atmosphere is exceedingly thick, Mars’ is quite thin. Simply put, Mars would resemble
Venus if it possessed a thicker atmosphere.
Additionally, with such a thin atmosphere, the resulting atmospheric pressure is only about
1% of that found at sea level on Earth. That is the equivalent pressure found at 35
km above the Earth’s surface.
One of the long standing areas of research regarding the Martian atmosphere is its impact
on the presence of liquid water. What the research has shown is that even though the
polar caps possess frozen water and the air contains water vapor—as a result of the
freezing temperatures and low pressure caused by the weak atmosphere—it is not
possible for liquid water to exist on the planet’s surface. However, evidence provided by
planetary missions suggests liquid water does exist one meter below the planet’s surface.
Surprisingly, despite the thin atmosphere, Mars experiences weather patterns. The
primary form of this weather consists of winds, with other manifestations that include dust
storms, frost, and fog. As a result of this weather, some erosion has been seen to take
place at particular locations on the planet’s surface.
As a final note on the Martian atmosphere, leading theories claim that it may have once
been dense enough to support large oceans of water. However, through some means in
the planet’s past the atmosphere was drastically altered. One popular explanation for this
change is that Mars was struck by a large body and in the process a large portion of its
atmosphere was ejected into space.
SURFACE
The surface of Mars can be separated into two broad features, which, coincidentally, are
divided by the planet’s hemisphere. The northern hemisphere is seen to be relatively
smooth with few craters, whereas the southern hemisphere is an area of highlands that
are more heavily cratered than the northern plains. Other than topographical differences,
the distinguishing feature of the two regions appears to be geological activity, with the
northen plains being much more active.
The Martian surface is home to both the largest known volcano,Olympus Mons, and
largest known canyon, Valles Marineris, in the Solar System. With a height of 25 km and
a base diameter of 600 km, Olympus Mons is three times the height of Mt. Everest, the
tallest mountain on the Earth. Valles Marineris is4,000 km long, 200 km wide, and
almost 7 km deep. To put the shear magnitude of its size into perspective, Valles
Marineris would stretch from the East to West coast of the United States.
Perhaps the most significant discovery regarding the Martian surface was the presence of
channels. What is so meaningful about these channels is that they appear to have been
created by running water, and thus providing evidence to support the theory that Mars
could have been much more similar to the Earth at one time.
A surface feature that has remained in popular culture since its image surfaced is the
“Face on Mars.” When this photograph was captured by the Viking I spacecraft in 1976,
many took it to be proof that alien life existed on Mars. However, subsequent images
showed that lighting (and a little imagination) are what brought life to the formation.
INTERIOR
Similar to the other terrestrial planets, Mars’ interior is divided into three layers: a crust,
mantle, and core.
It takes Mars about 24 hours 40 minutes to complete one full rotation, easily making the
Martian day the closest in length to an Earth day.
At roughly 25°, Mars’ axial tilt is yet another similarity the planet shares with Earth. What
this means is Mars actually experiences seasons like those on Earth, though each is
substantially longer because of the orbital distance of Mars. Unlike the Earth, however,
Mars’ two hemispheres experience quite different temepratures for each season. This is
due to the much larger eccentricity of the planet’s orbit.