New Rover Design for Exploration of Venus

Nasa is proposing a windsurfing rover that it claims could to take on Venus' severe environment by sailing across its surface. The rover, dubbed the Zephyr, is designed to work at extremely low powers while carrying electronics that can function at a temperature of 450°C.

Dr Landis claims the ideal vehicle to do so would need to be able to rove across the surface using the ambient resources of the planet. ‘One approach is just live with the high temperatures by using high-temperature devices,’ said Mr Landis.

Venus’ environment is comparable to inside of a revved up jet engine, and Glenn technologists have pioneered sensors that can work in these conditions.

Link to full article

This is, of course, by no means a guarantee of a mission and will join the list of proposals already on the table such as the nuclear powered Stirling cooled rover here, and proposals for balloon missions above the planet's surface.

I think it's great that more mission proposals are being drawn up for Venus. It's still very much a geologically active planet and if we can determine what set it on its current path to super greenhouse status and help further explain away the lack of conventional plate tectonics then it very well may help narrow down any future list of Earth sized exoplanets where we look for life.

Very cool idea.

Especially as it comes from Geoffrey Landis who, if you don't know, is both a Hugh- and Nebula-winning hard SF author.

Which leads me to believe this is a nice idea, but NASA won't likely do anything with it.

I highly recommend his books!

One would think you could harness the power you need from that heat?

reply to post by NoExpert


Yes, this is a cool idea, but JEEZ! before I die I want to see what kind of aquatic life is living in the oceans under the ice of Europa or Ganymede - Jupiter's moons.

I KNOW there's good fishing there.

Originally posted by NoExpert

 

I think it's great that more mission proposals are being drawn up for Venus. It's still very much a geologically active planet and if we can determine what set it on its current path to super greenhouse status and help further explain away the lack of conventional plate tectonics then it very well may help narrow down any future list of Earth sized exoplanets where we look for life.

Apart from the essential exploration of Mars, I'm glad Venus is back in our focus with this mission proposal. As you mentioned above, potentially extant life on our neighbor planet is not entirely impossible, especially in the upper layers of Venus' atmosphere.

But when taking into account the eeringly similar composition of Venus (when compared to Earth) in the remote past, the exploration of past life is IMO just as interesting as looking for extant life. We don't know much about Venus and there's a good chance that - over 2 billion years (perhaps even more) - the surface conditions were very similar to those of Earth, incl. vast oceans etc. I became increasingly interested in Venus when posting on the topic in another thread here, here and here.

Thanks for providing some food for thought with this thread and I really hope this mission will become reality ASAP!


ETA: Though I admit it will probably be difficult to find signs of past life directly on the surface with temperatures of at least 450°C, extremely high pressure rates and after a major (probably volcanic) reshaping of the entire surface some millions of years ago ... but some general clues about past habitability on Venus could certainly be found. And those would surely also be helpful in determining when and how Venus turned into greenhouse hell, and of course, how it might have been there before.