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Friday, 15 May 2009 10:10 |
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A mosaic of images collected by MESSENGER's Narrow Angle Camera as the spacecraft approached Mercury on 6 October 2008. The Rembrandt impact basin is seen at the center as night was falling across its eastern edge. Image: NASA/JHU/APL/ASU/CIW. | New results from the MESSENGER mission to Mercury team are featured in four papers that will be published tomorrow in the 1 May issue of Science. The papers will discuss the discovery of magnesium in Mercury’s atmosphere; radical differences in the planet's magnetosphere between the first and second flybys; the previously unknown Rembrandt impact basin; and Mercury’s crustal evolution. DTM director and Principal Investigator Sean Solomon commented, “MESSENGER’s second Mercury flyby provided a number of new findings. One of the biggest surprises was how strongly the planet’s magnetospheric dynamics changed from what we saw during the first Mercury flyby in January 2008. Another was the discovery of a large and unusually well preserved impact basin that was the focus for concentrated volcanic and deformational activity. The first detection of magnesium in Mercury’s exosphere and neutral tail provides confirmation that magnesium is an important constituent of Mercury’s surface materials. And our nearly global imaging coverage of the surface after this flyby has given us fresh insight into how the planet’s crust was formed.” The MESSENGER team continues to examine data from the first two flybys and is preparing to gather even more information from a third flyby of the planet on September 29, 2009. For information, see the MESSENGER Web site.
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