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Science Our MESSENGER to Mercury sends home important data
Science Our MESSENGER to Mercury sends home important data | Our MESSENGER to Mercury sends home important data |
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| by William Atkins | |
| Saturday, 05 July 2008 | |
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Page 3 of 3 As this core cooled over Mercury’s long history, it caused the planet to shrink (contract). This has led to surface features called lobate scarps (or cliff-like “wrinkles”). Featured Whitepaper
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Science DiscussionsSean Solomon (Carnegie Institution of Washington), the principal investigator of the mission, states, "The dominant tectonic landforms on Mercury are lobate scarps, huge cliffs that mark the tops of crustal faults that formed during the contraction of the surrounding area. They tell us how important the cooling core has been to the evolution of the surface. After the end of the period of heavy bombardment, cooling of the planet's core not only fuels the magnetic dynamo, but also led to contraction of the entire planet. And the data from the flyby indicate that the total contraction is a least one third greater than we previously thought." [NASA] Impact craters were also observed by MESSENGER. The first measurements of the altitudes on Mercury show that some of the craters on the planet are about half the depth of craters on the Moon. Such images help astronomers to determine the ages of surface features and to resolve the steps involved in shaping the planet’s surface. Meteorite impacts and the solar wind, because the Sun is so close to the planet, have caused a great deal of weathering on the planet. The results from the January 14, 2008 fly-by of Mercury by MESSENGER is found in a series of eleven papers published in a special section of Science magazine on July 4, 2008. Many of them discuss the surface of Mercury with respect to its reflectance and color variation, chemistry, and altitude. Many of the instruments aboard MESSENGER targeted different wavelengths of radiation in order to collect a complete picture of Mercury. If you have a subscription to the magazine, the eleven articles are found at Science MESSENGER. The study of Mercury, like the study of the other planets of our solar system helps us understand our planet Earth in better and more complete ways. We learn more about how Earth evolved and developed by learning how these planets also evolved and developed—sometimes similar to our Earth but at other times very differently. Solomon adds, "It's remarkable that this rich lode of data came from two days of imaging, just 30 minutes of sampling the planet's magnetosphere and exosphere, and less than ten minutes carrying out altimetry and collecting other data near the time of its closest approach. MESSENGER's flyby was a huge success." [NASA] The MESSENGER spacecraft will fly past Mercury on two future occasions (again in October 2008 and September 2009), before it finally is inserted into orbit about the planet in 2011. For more information on the NASA mission MESSENGER to the planet Mercury, go to: NASA: “MESSENGER Settles Old Debates and Makes New Discoveries at Mercury” Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab: “Mercury’s Newly Named Features” NASA Solar System Exploration: “Mission to Mercury” Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab: “Mercury Flyby 1” |
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