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The planet's period of retrograde motion is 20 days on either side of the inferior conjunction. In fact, through a telescope Venus at greatest elongation appears less than half full due to Schröter's effect first noticed in 1793 and shown in 1996 as due to its thick atmosphere. Venus in daylight at 5 p.m. in the southern hemisphere ...
The greatest elongation of a given inferior planet occurs when this planet's position, in its orbital path around the Sun, is at tangent to the observer on Earth. Since an inferior planet is well within the area of Earth's orbit around the Sun, observation of its elongation should not pose that much a challenge (compared to deep-sky objects, for example).
The orbit of Venus is 224.7 Earth days (7.4 avg. Earth months [30.4 days]). The phases of Venus result from the planet's orbit around the Sun inside the Earth's orbit giving the telescopic observer a sequence of progressive lighting similar in appearance to the Moon's phases. It presents a full image when it is on the opposite side of the Sun.
Venus is the second planet from the Sun. It is a terrestrial planet and is the closest in mass and size to its orbital neighbour Earth. Venus has by far the densest atmosphere of the terrestrial planets, composed mostly of carbon dioxide with a thick, global sulfuric acid cloud cover.
Venus probably began with a fast prograde rotation with a period of several hours much like most of the planets in the Solar System. Venus is close enough to the Sun to experience significant gravitational tidal dissipation, and also has a thick enough atmosphere to create thermally driven atmospheric tides that create a retrograde torque.
The Belt of Venus as seen from an airliner at an altitude of 42,000 ft (13 km; 8.0 mi) An animated sequence of the Belt of Venus at dusk, showing how its appearance evolves during evening twilight The Belt of Venus – also called Venus's Girdle , the antitwilight arch , or antitwilight [ 1 ] – is an atmospheric phenomenon visible shortly ...
Five synodic periods of Venus is almost exactly 13 sidereal Venus years and 8 Earth years, and consequently the longitudes and distances almost repeat. [ 5 ] The 3.4° inclination of Venus's orbit is great enough to usually prevent the inferior planet from passing directly between the Sun and Earth at inferior conjunction.
A transit of Venus takes place when Venus passes directly between the Sun and the Earth (or any other superior planet), becoming visible against (and hence obscuring a small portion of) the solar disk. During a transit, Venus is visible as a small black circle moving across the face of the Sun. Transits of Venus reoccur periodically.