Close-up on venusian clouds at mid-latitudes

This false-colour ultraviolet image of the atmopshere of Venus was obtained by the Venus Monitoring Camera (VMC) on board ESA’s Venus Express on 27 July 2007 from a distance of about 15 000 km, at a wavelength of 365 nanometres. The edge of the southern polar hood is seen at the bottom. The octagonal shape of the image is due to the VMC field of view.

This image shows the transition between the equatorial area dominated by convection and the mid-latitude area populated by streaky clouds. This region is located at about 40-50 degrees latitude. The way the transition between structures and dynamics so different from each other occurs, is one of the outstanding enigmas in our understanding Venus.