Although it is named after the Roman goddess of love, the planet Venus is more like the EarthΓÇÖs evil twin. Nearly the same diameter and mass as Earth, Venus is enshrouded in a heavy atmosphere consisting primarily of carbon dioxide, with clouds of corrosive sulfuric acid and noxious sulfur dioxide. At the surface, the atmospheric pressure is 90 times that of the Earth at sea levelΓÇö enough to crush almost any man-made structure on our planet. Moreover, the heavy atmosphere traps solar heat, making VenusΓÇö depite the fact that it is twice as far from the Sun as MercuryΓÇöthe hottest planet in the solar system. Daytime temperatures of over 730 degrees Kelvin have been measured.
