Venus
Venus is the second planet from the Sun. It is named after the Roman goddess of love and beauty. As the second-brightest natural object in the night sky after the Moon, Venus can cast shadows and, rarely, is visible to the naked eye in broad daylight. Venus lies within Earth's orbit, and so never appears to venture far from the Sun, either setting in the west just after dusk or rising in the east a bit before dawn.
Venus is a terrestrial planet and is sometimes called Earth's "sister planet" because of their similar size, mass, proximity to the Sun, and bulk composition. It is radically different from Earth in other respects. It has the densest atmosphere of the four terrestrial planets, consisting of more than 96% carbon dioxide. The atmospheric pressure at the planet's surface is 92 times that of Earth, or roughly the pressure found 900 m (3,000 ft) underwater on Earth.
Venus Facts
- Surface Area: 4.6023×108 km2(0.902 Earths)
- Volume: 9.2843×1011 km3(0.866 Earths)
- Mass: 4.8675×1024 kg(0.815 Earths)
- Moons: none
- Orbit Distance: 108 million km(0.72AU)
- Orbit Period: 243 Earth days
- Surface Temperature: 462°C
- First Record: Mid-senenteenth century BCE