IS VENUS THE EVIL BROTHER OF THE EARTH?

Over time Venus has been seen as the brother of the Earth, this because it has very similar characteristics: it has a size almost as large as that of our planet, and almost 90% of the mass. Until the decade of the 60, many speculated with the possibility that the second planet of the Solar System was a tropical paradise. But, fifty years later and with the help of many scientific works we already know that Venus is a very different world from ours.

Venus is the warmest planet in the Solar System, with an average temperature of about 460º C, it was thought to be a tropical paradise but rather, it is a real hell, dominated by an extremely dense layer of clouds, and atmospheric pressure 92 times higher than what we experienced here (or in other words, if you could be on the surface of Venus, you would experience the same pressure as at the bottom of the sea) and as if it were not enough its infernal atmosphere is composed of sulfuric acid and dioxide carbon.

Water can only exist in the form of vapor, on the surface the temperature makes it impossible for there to be life, the atmosphere is not pleasant either. In order to find a point with a pressure similar to that of the Earth, it would have to rise to 50 kilometers above its surface. NASA has suggested that, perhaps at some point, we could explore Venus with the use of airships (not airplanes). It could even be more efficient than traveling to Mars, since it is closer to us.

In spite of everything, Carl Sagan suggested back in the 60s that there could be life forms in the atmosphere, especially related to acid (if there was ever life there).

It is observed that the lava flows freely on the surface of Venus, and represents a place full of volcanoes (although astronomers are not completely sure of what is the geological activity of the planet, and therefore, what part of "guilt" they have in that it is a place with such extremely extreme conditions).

Apart from all this, the surface of Venus is hit by hurricane winds of 360 km / h, has no seasons and also continues to slow its rotation.

The axis of Venus is not inclined with respect to its plane, which differentiates it from Earth, and therefore, does not experience seasonal variations. In addition, it takes longer to turn on itself (243 days) than to orbit around the Sun (224), and, surprisingly, its rotation continues to slow down (since 1990, astronomers estimate that Venus rotation has slowed down in about 6 minutes ).

Together with Uranus, which has retrograde rotation, that is, it turns on itself in the opposite direction to that of other planets. From its surface, the Sun rises in the west and sets in the east (about 116 days later).

Despite everything explained for a long time, it was believed that Venus was populated by lush tropical forests. There are evidences, of the different missions that have explored Venus, that make astronomers think that, formerly, the planet could have a climate very similar to Earth, and a surface formed by oceans and continents.

It is difficult to know if on its surface there could be life, much less complex life, but it is clear that, in the case of our sister planet, the lack of a strong magnetic field could have been the main cause of not having retained an atmosphere more similar to ours (Venus has a rather weak magnetic field, generated by the interaction of the ionosphere with the solar wind, but nothing generated by the planet's core, which could point to its core completely solidified , something that has not been proven with certainty until now).