What does it mean for a planet to have a negative rotation period?

What does it mean for a planet to have a negative rotation period?

retrograde
Rotation Period (hours) – This is the time it takes for the planet to complete one rotation relative to the fixed background stars (not relative to the Sun) in hours. Negative numbers indicate retrograde (backwards relative to the Earth) rotation.

What happens every 243 days on Venus?

Venus is unusual because it spins the opposite direction of Earth and most other planets. And its rotation is very slow. It takes about 243 Earth days to spin around just once. That means the Sun rises two times during each year on Venus, even though it is still the same day on Venus!

How long does it take Venus to make one rotation?

243 Earth
A planet’s day is the time it takes the planet to rotate or spin once on its axis. Venus rotates much more slowly than Earth does, so a day on Venus is much longer than a day on Earth. A day on Venus lasts for 243 Earth days or 5,832 hours! A day on Earth is 23.943 hours.

What planet takes 243 days to rotate once?

Venus
A day on Venus is longer than a year It takes Venus longer to rotate once on its axis than to complete one orbit of the Sun. That’s 243 Earth days to rotate once – the longest rotation of any planet in the Solar System – and only 224.7 Earth days to complete one orbit of the Sun.

What is the orbit and rotation of Venus?

Venus lies within Earth’s orbit, and so never appears to venture far from the Sun, either setting in the west just after dusk or rising in the east a little while before dawn. Venus orbits the Sun every 224.7 Earth days. It has a synodic day length of 117 Earth days and a sidereal rotation period of 243 Earth days.

At which position is Venus closest to Earth?

Indeed, when Earth and Venus are at their closest approach, their separation is roughly 0.28 AU—no other planet gets nearer to Earth. But just as often, the two planets are at their most distant, when Venus is on the side of the Sun opposite Earth, 1.72 AU away.

How many Earth days does it take for Venus to rotate?

And its rotation is very slow. It takes about 243 Earth days to spin around just once. Because it’s so close to the Sun, a year goes by fast. It takes 225 Earth days for Venus to go all the way around the Sun. That means that a day on Venus is a little longer than a year on Venus.

What’s the average length of a year on Venus?

As a result of Venus’s relatively long solar day, one Venus year is about 1.92 Venus days long. A curious aspect of the Venusian orbit and rotation periods is that the 584-day average interval between successive close approaches to the Earth is almost exactly equal to five Venusian solar days.

How does the Sun work on Venus compared to Earth?

Yes, when it comes to the planet Venus, things work quite differently than they do here on Earth. Not only does a day last over half a year on our “Sister Planet”, but the Sun rises and sets on the opposite horizons, and travels across the sky in the opposite direction.

How many astronomical units is Venus away from the Sun?

From an average distance of 67 million miles (108 million kilometers), Venus is 0.7 astronomical units away from the Sun. One astronomical unit (abbreviated as AU), is the distance from the Sun to Earth.