An image of Venus from Sardinia is NASA’s Picture of the Day

Venus in its Phases is an August 26th astronomical image by NASA, author of Recovery by Sardinian astrophotographer Roberto Orto da Capras. Venus, the planet named after the goddess of love, appears to our eyes as a brilliant star, the brightest in the sky. In recent months, Venus has become visible after sunset, and in the last weeks of July it has gradually approached the Sun, disappearing from view in the twilight lights. To understand the true nature of Venus, the planet must be observed through a telescope. And the first to do so was Galileo Galilei, who noticed that Venus shows phases like the moon.

Not only that, as the phase changes, Venus changes its apparent size, becoming larger when only a small piece of it is observed. Thanks to these observations, Galileo found evidence that he had placed Venus around the Sun and thus the other planets as well, including the Earth. Astrophotographer Roberto Orto tried to photograph Venus through a telescope during the last months, from May 23 to August 8, to be able to immortalize this phenomenon.

The beautiful shot has been chosen as Picture of the Day by the curators of the APOD Astronomy Picture of the Day page, which is sponsored by NASA. The planet Venus with its phases taken from Sardinia is now one of the images that tell the story of the universe, on the page of the most visited photography of the universe in the world.

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