VERITAS’ stablemate is
DAVINCI+, or “Deep Atmosphere Venus Investigation of Noble gases, Chemistry and Imaging.” The DAVINCI+ mission also involves an orbiter, but the real star of the show will be the meter-wide atmospheric probe. The probe will drop into Venus’ atmosphere and free-fall through the thick clouds for about an hour before reaching the surface.
On the way down, it will take samples of the atmosphere, specifically measuring a variety of gases including argon, krypton and xenon. Different climate histories for Venus would lead to different ratios of these noble gases in the atmosphere – and so by analyzing these ratios, scientists will be able to work out how much water the planet formed with, and even how much water it has lost over the past 4.5 billion years.
But that’s not all the probe will do. Just before impacting crash landing into an area called
Alpha Regio that has some of the oldest rocks on the planet, the probe will take infrared images of the surface as it comes into view through the gloom of the lower atmosphere. Those images will be the first ever taken from above the surface but below the cloud deck, showing planetary scientists Venus as never before.