What governs the escape processes of the atmosphere?
• Are there water, carbon dioxide or sulphuric acid cycles on Venus? • What caused the global volcanic resurfacing of Venus 500 million years ago? • Why are some areas on the surface so reflective to radar? • Is there present volcanic or seismic activity on the planet? • Why Venus rotates backwards and so slowly, just one revolution every 243 Earth days? • Why is the planet’s magnetic field so weak? What can the study of Venus bring to our everyday life on Earth? Comparative planetology can bring a lot to our understanding of Earth and our environment. Venus and Earth could have been expected to be similar (and may have been in their early histories), but we do not know why they evolved so differently. If their atmospheres were very similar in the beiginning, then obviously something changed on Earth or on Venus, but we do not know what or when. Moreover, the ‘greenhouse effect’ alone cannot account for today’s extreme conditions on Venus. Most importantly, the combined knowledge of st
