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Donald Savage

Headquarters, Washington, D.C.


June 28, 1994
(Phone: 202/358-1547)

Jim Doyle
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
(Phone: 818/354-5011)

RELEASE: 94-105

VENUS STILL GEOLOGICALLY ACTIVE, MAGELLAN FINDS

The planet Venus is still geologically active in places, even


though radar images of its surface indicate that little has
changed in the past half-billion years, a scientist working on
data from NASA's Magellan mission has found.

Dr. Suzanne Smrekar, a geophysicist at NASA's Jet Propulsion


Laboratory (JPL), Pasadena, Calif., said her studies, based on
Magellan spacecraft altimetry and gravity data, suggest that there
are at least two, and possibly more, active hot spots on Venus.

Her paper, entitled "Evidence for Active Hotspots on Venus from


Analysis of Magellan Gravity Data," is to be published later this
year in the science publication, Icarus. Smrekar earlier
presented her findings before a meeting of the Lunar and Planetary
Science conference in Houston, Texas.

The Magellan spacecraft went into orbit around Venus in August of


1990 and over the next two years mapped about 98 percent of the
planet's surface with imaging radar. It then began to gather
gravity data to help scientists develop a model of the planet's
interior.

Gravity is measured using only the spacecraft's radio signal.


This technique allows ground controllers to measure the
spacecraft's speed in orbit as it increases in velocity over
regions of high density or slows down over regions of lesser
density.
Magellan's altimetry instrument measured the height of features on
the surface of the planet.

The gravity data showed evidence of "top loading" and "bottom


loading" at several locations, Smrekar said. Top loading is
evidence of a large mass, such as a mountain or volcano, pushing
down on the crustal plate. At hot spots, bottom loading indicates
an upwelling of less dense and, therefore, hotter material beneath
the surface.
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"The matter rises and is pushed upward because it is hot and thus
less dense," she said. "As it nears the surface, it produces
volcanism." The mechanisms are similar to those which occur on
Earth and which produce volcanoes like those on Hawaii.

Earlier data from the spacecraft's imaging radar showed that much
of the surface of Venus had been covered in the past by lava
flows.

Smrekar said two regions on Venus -- Atla Regio and Bell Regio --
exhibited clear signatures of both bottom and top loading of the
elastic surface.

The signatures from the data are indicative of an active hot spot
at Atla Regio, Smrekar said. Although the loading response is
less clear, the data from Western Eistla and Beta Regio also
support the interpretation that those areas are underlain by
large, hot areas, probably due to active plumes in the mantle
beneath the planet's crust.

At Bell Regio, Smrekar found indications of a late, possibly


inactive, evolutionary stage of a low-density layer that is no
longer very hot.

"These early results from a survey of four major volcanic swells


on Venus reveal hot spots in different stages of evolution,"
Smrekar noted in her paper. "Analysis confirms that the Beta,
Atla and Western Eistla regions are active hot spots."

Smrekar said future studies of those areas and other possible hot
spots on Venus would continue to improve scientists' understanding
of the evolution of hot spots on both Venus and Earth.

Her work at JPL was done under contract to NASA's Office of Space
Science, Washington, D.C.

- end -

NOTE TO EDITORS : A four-part image depicting gravity results at


Venus is available by faxing your request to the Headquarters
Broadcast and Imaging Branch on 202/358-4333. The photo numbers
are: B & W: 94-H-179; Color: 94-HC-167.

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