And news this week from NASA only strengthens my position.
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The space agency shared a new photo captured by NASA’s Parker Solar Probe of Venus while probe used the planet’s gravity to sweep itself to its final destination: The Sun
The black-and-white image was taken from 7,693 miles from Venus. To the layman, it looks pretty cool: there’s a planet and stars going on and maybe some kind of movement. But honestly, I’ve seen better, especially during the last few weeks.
However, according to NASA, the image is full of surprises. As Space.com puts it, Venus “looks nothing like scientists expected.”
What?!
In a statement released this week, NASA scientists explained that the camera aboard the Parker Solar Probe, known as the Wide-field Imager for Parker Solar Probe (or WISPR), is an image of a bright edge around the edge of the planet. it may be night glare and the Aphrodite Terra of the planet, the largest highland region on the Venusian surface, of which there are about 85 degrees cooler than its surroundings.
It’s exciting and all, but according to NASA, they were just expecting to see some clouds.
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This means that the WISPR device we shot into space is not working as we thought it would. Instead of capturing only visible light, the images suggest that the camera may also record near-infrared wavelengths of light, enabling scientists to do further research on dust around the sun and in the solar system. .
Or – and this is where I’m going a little crazy – it could mean that there are changes taking place in the normally thick, cloudy Venus atmosphere that Earthlings were not yet aware of.
“Either way,” says Angelos Vourlidas, the scientist who helped develop WISPR, “there are some exciting scientific opportunities ahead of us.”
My mind exactly.
The latest photos were of the probe’s flying through Venus in July 2020. The investigation passed the planet again earlier this month, on February 20, and the WISPR team planned to take more images to draw a conclusion from it. It will not be until the end of April before the statues return to earth.
Look, there’s another thing I do not care about: really low upload speeds.