Why do scientists focus more on exploring and colonizing Mars instead of Earth's other next-door neighbor Venus?
It's simple: although Venus is the closest to Earth at 26 million miles away, the planet's surface is scorching hot and completely uninhabitable that any scientific equipment sent to it will be incinerated.
Indeed, the surface of Venus reaches temperatures of at least 872 degrees Fahrenheit (466.67 degrees Celsius), and its atmospheric pressure is 92 times stronger than that on Earth. It's equivalent to staying 3,000 feet underwater.
All this makes a rover's trip to Venus almost impossible, until now: scientists from NASA may have finally found a way to make electronics survive and resist heat on the surface of Venus.
Heat-resistant Electronics
Any scientific equipment sent to Venus would have required external cooling systems and pressure vessels to keep important electronics safe. For instance, a traditional silicon chip can withstand temperatures of 480 degrees Fahrenheit (250 degrees Celsius) before its semiconductors break down.
This time, however, engineers at NASA's Glenn Research Center developed a computer chip that makes use of a different mechanism.
By combining interconnected wires with silicon carbide-based (SiC) transistors, a technology which first emerged in heavy industries and the military, NASA scientists successfully built a ceramic-coated computer chip that can resist conditions on Venus without any other external protection.
How did they do it? Researchers tossed an oscillator into the Glenn Extreme Environments Rig, increased the machine's heat and pressure levels equivalent to that on Venus, and observed what would happen.
After 521 hours or almost 22 days, scientists removed the oscillator from the machine and saw incredible results. The computer chip survived extreme heat, while the Glenn Extreme Environments Rig had to be shut down after working non-stop for three weeks.
Sending A Rover To Venus
Given the results of the team's experiment, will scientists be able to send a rover to Venus soon?
When you look at the previous record of survival on the planet's surface and compare it to that of the SiC computer chip, you would feel hopeful.
In 1982, a Soviet craft called Venera 13 managed to remain at the surface for two hours and seven minutes before dying. In comparison, NASA's computer chip is estimated to last 500 hours more than Venera 13.
Sadly, there's still a long way to go before scientists can send a rover to Venus. When that happens, however, it will greatly increase the amount of data we can glean about the planet's environment. It may even help supplement plans to build a "cloud city" that floats above Venus.
Details of the experiment are featured on the journal AIP Advances.
