Venus

Standing out in the cold and frosty nights that are around us, here in Galway at the moment, the most prominent evening object (apart from the Moon!) is the planet Venus. It's a fascinating object and one that played a pivotal role in the development of our view of the universe with Galileo's observations. In addition, it is a remarkable "sister planet" of the Earth, with its runaway greenhouse atmosphere perhaps a pertinent warning!! 

Anyway, it forms the subject of our next podcast episode (online later this week) but to whet the appetite, here's the picture of Venus (bottom series) that Galileo drew from his telescope observations, a series of sketches that had a profound effect at the time....but you'll have to wait for that!