Washington: A team of scientists at NASA want to put a sail-powered rover on Venus` surface.
Principal investigator Geoffrey Landis and his team have been looking at electronics and power sources that will hold up in these harsh conditions for Zephyr, their landsail rover named after one the Greek wind gods, ABC News reported.
Paul Mahaffy, the principal investigator behind the SAM suite of instruments on board the Curiosity rover on Mars, said that NASA has tried to do rigorous measurements in Venus`s atmosphere but failed.
Landis`s team went with a landsail design because it takes advantage of the planet`s flat topography and its calm winds.
The rover would be passively powered by the sail and any electric power can instead be directed to the radio and the scientific instruments, he said.
ANI
