Deriving iron contents from past and future Venus surface spectra with new high-temperature laboratory emissivity data

In situ information on the surface composition of Venus is based on measurements of a small number of landing sites. In the laboratory, we measured the emissivity of a range of igneous rocks at temperatures up to 480°C. We show that high-temperature laboratory spectra of basalts are consistent with the only existing multispectral data from the surface of Venus obtained by the photometers on the Venera 9 and 10 landers. We derive the FeO abundances for these landing sites of 12.2 and 9.5 weight %, respectively. From orbit, Venus’ surface is only observable on the nightside through small spectral windows near 1 μm where the CO2 atmosphere is largely transparent. The new laboratory data show that different rock types can be distinguished using only a small set of spectral bands. Therefore, future orbital spectral observations can provide a much-needed global composition map.