Venus express

Scientists this week revealed their plans to analyse the magnetic field around Venus in a bid to discover whether the planets lack of an internal magnetic field is the reason it is so inhospitable.

At a press conference in London hosted by the Particle Physics and Astronomy Research Council, Chris Carr of Imperial College London described how the magnetometer instrument onboard the Venus Express spacecraft will measure the magnetic field around the planet.

Scientists hope their results will confirm why Venus is so inhospitable in comparison to Earth and has almost no water, in spite of the similarities between the two planets. Earth and Venus formed at the same time from the same basic materials and they are very similar in size and mass.

Scientists believe that Venus is inhospitable because its atmosphere is being eroded by the solar wind, a magnetised, electrically charged gas that streams off the Sun at a million miles per hour. This 'plasma' from the Sun slams into an electrically charged part of Venus's atmosphere known as the ionosphere, which is ionised by solar radiation.