1. Basic Statistics and Motion
Venus
Basic Statistics and Motion

2. Roman Goddess of Beauty
Size and Mass
Radius: 6,051 km (94.9% of Earth’s)
It’s just a little smaller than Earth.
Mass: .815 of Earth Masses (4.87 x 10^24 kg)
It’s just a little less massive
Density: 5.25 g/cm³ ( 95.1% of Earth’s)
About the same
Surface Gravity: 8.87 m/s² (90.5% of Earth’s)
That’s why it is known as Earth’s Twin.
Name Origin
Roman Goddess of Beauty

3. Orbit Rotation Radius: .723 AU ( 108.2 million km)
Period (year): Earth days
Rotation
Sidereal Day (Period): 243 Earth days
Solar Day: 117 Earth days
Direction: Retrograde
Because…Venus is tilted almost upside down (177°)
Thus it spins backward compared to other planets!
Therefore the revolution and rotation work together to make the solar day shorter than the Sidereal day

4. A Weak Magnetic Field The Venusian magnetic field is weak
compared to Earth
because
It spins so slowly
(Thus Venus is not protected from the Solar Wind/Flares)

5. Why the weird spin? Two Hypotheses:
Tilt: Venus collided with a very large planetismal that Flipped it over (and may have slowed it down).
Speed: Tidal forces from the Sun and Earth influenced its spin