Venus Flagship Mission Planetary Decadal Survey Study

Abstract:

More than any other known planet, Venus is essential to our understanding of the evolution and habitability of Earth-size planets throughout the galaxy. The Venus Flagship Mission (VFM) address two critical questions for planetary science: 1) How, if at all, did Venus evolve through a habitable phase? 2) What circumstances affect how volatiles shape habitable worlds? More than any other group, volatile elements have a strong influence on the evolutionary paths of rocky bodies and are critical to understanding solar system evolution. Venus experienced a different volatile history compared to the Earth and provides only accessible example of a potentially habitable Earth-size planet. Venus will allow us to identify the mechanisms that operate together to produce and maintain habitable worlds like our own.

The VFM architecture relies on five collaborative platforms: an Orbiter, Lander, variable-altitude Aerobot (60 day lifetime in the cloud deck) and two Small Satellites (SmallSats) delivered via single launch on a Falcon 9 heavy expendable that will measure the exosphere, atmosphere and surface at multiple scales with high precision and over time. VFM would provide the first measurements of mineralogy and geochemistry of tessera terrain to examine rocks considered to be among the most likely to have formed in an ancient habitable climate regime. The landed, descent, aerial and orbital platforms will work synergistically to measure the chemical composition of the atmosphere. Loss mechanisms will be constrained by the SmallSats and Orbiter in three different orbits. The VFM would make the first measurements of seismicity and remanent magnetism, the first long-lived (60 day) surface platform, and the first life detection instrument at Venus to interrogate what could be an inhabited world.

The VFM concept directly addresses each of the three Venus Exploration Analysis Group (VEXAG) goals as well as several of the strategic objectives of the 2020 NASA Science Plan, Planetary Science Division, Heliophysics and Astrophysics. The simultaneous, synergistic measurements of the solid body, surface, atmosphere and space environment provided by the VFM will allow us to target the most accessible Earth-size planet in our galaxy, and gain a profound new understanding of the evolution of our solar system and habitable worlds.