That means it spins nearly perfectly upright and so does not experience seasons like many other planets do. It is the closest planet to the Sun, but it’s actually not the hottest. [123], The earliest known recorded observations of Mercury are from the Mul.Apin tablets. Instead of an atmosphere, Mercury possesses a thin exosphere made up of atoms blasted off the surface by the solar wind and striking meteoroids. Venus is hotter. Due to Mercury's 3:2 spin-orbit resonance, a solar day (the length between two meridian transits of the Sun) lasts about 176 Earth days. According to a new UN report, the amount of the planet's natural resources extracted for human use has tripled in 40 years. A device called SHERLOC will help the next Mars rover detect chemicals linked to the existence of life. Firstly, on the basis of origin, natural resources are divided into two types. This made close observation of both sides of the planet impossible,[173] and resulted in the mapping of less than 45% of the planet's surface. They provided the first views that resolved surface features on the parts of Mercury that were not imaged in the Mariner 10 mission. [113] In the early 20th century, Albert Einstein's general theory of relativity provided the explanation for the observed precession, by formalizing gravitation as being mediated by the curvature of spacetime. One astronomical unit (abbreviated as AU), is the distance from the Sun to Earth. [13] The mean apparent magnitude is 0.23 while the standard deviation of 1.78 is the largest of any planet. The planet is rendered invisible from Earth on both of these occasions because of its being obscured by the Sun,[119] except its new phase during a transit. [129] The cuneiform name used to designate Mercury on the Mul.Apin tablets is transcribed as Udu.Idim.Gu\u4.Ud ("the jumping planet"). Venus is hotter. A 1970 International Astronomical Union resolution suggests that longitudes be measured positively in the westerly direction on Mercury. Viewed from low latitudes and at the right times of year, the ecliptic intersects the horizon at a steep angle. [92], At certain points on Mercury's surface, an observer would be able to see the Sun peek up a little more than two-thirds of the way over the horizon, then reverse and set before rising again, all within the same Mercurian day. [76][77], Sodium, potassium and calcium were discovered in the atmosphere during the 1980â1990s, and are thought to result primarily from the vaporization of surface rock struck by micrometeorite impacts[78] including presently from Comet Encke. [81] Unlike Earth's, Mercury's poles are nearly aligned with the planet's spin axis. The probe finished a one-year mapping mission,[181] and then entered a one-year extended mission into 2013. The Next Full Moon is the Strawberry Moon, Mead Moon, Honey Moon, Vat Purnima, Poson Poya, and the LRO Moon. [159][160] The theory that Mercury's rotation was synchronous had become widely held, and it was a surprise to astronomers when these radio observations were announced. A Mercury-bound spacecraft launched from Earth must travel over 91 million kilometres (57 million miles) into the Sun's gravitational potential well. However, when this area was first visited, by Mariner 10, this zero meridian was in darkness, so it was impossible to select a feature on the surface to define the exact position of the meridian. A trip to Mercury requires more rocket fuel than that required to escape the Solar System completely. In the diagram the varying distance of Mercury to the Sun is represented by the size of the planet, which is inversely proportional to Mercury's distance from the Sun. [152], The difficulties inherent in observing Mercury mean that it has been far less studied than the other planets. Like the Moon and Venus, Mercury exhibits phases as seen from Earth. "MUL" is a cuneiform sign that was used in the Sumerian language to designate a star or planet, but it is not considered part of the actual name. Mercury's magnetic field is offset relative to the planet's equator. Therefore, a small crater further west was chosen, called Hun Kal, which provides the exact reference point for measuring longitude. Directors of Mercury Natural Resources Private Limited are Siddharth Abhaikumar Nahar, Manish Omprakash Khemani and Prafull Ramendra Rai. But when Mercury is moving fastest in its elliptical orbit around the Sun (and it is closest to the Sun), each rotation is not accompanied by a sunrise and sunset like it is on most other planets. e [174], The spacecraft made three close approaches to Mercury, the closest of which took it to within 327 km (203 mi) of the surface. For example, essentially because Mercury is closer to the Sun than Venus, Mercury spends more time in proximity to Earth; it could, therefore, be said that Mercury is the planet that is 'closest to Earth when averaged over time'. Bill Dunford, A 3D model of Mercury, the innermost planet. Just as dust gathers in corners and along bookshelves in our homes, dust piles up in space too. People's Voice voting is underway. The bright streaks are called "crater rays." Mercury's temperatures can go between -279 Fahrenheit (-173 Celsius) at night to 801 Fahrenheit (427 Celsius) during the day. They rose as the planet's interior cooled and contracted over the billions of years since Mercury formed. From the surface of Mercury, the Sun would appear more than three times as large as it does when viewed from Earth, and the sunlight would be as much as seven times brighter. Some of this crushed material is thrown far from the crater and then falls to the surface, forming the rays. [127], The Hubble Space Telescope cannot observe Mercury at all, due to safety procedures that prevent its pointing too close to the Sun. on autumn evenings). T This was thought to explain Mercury's 3:2 spin-orbit resonance (rather than the more usual 1:1), because this state is more likely to arise during a period of high eccentricity. The Caloris basin is the largest single feature on the planet, probably caused by the impact of a large meteorite. These twisted magnetic flux tubes, technically known as flux transfer events, form open windows in the planet's magnetic shield through which the solar wind may enter and directly impact Mercury's surface via magnetic reconnection[87] This also occurs in Earth's magnetic field. Credit: NASA Visualization Technology Applications and Development (VTAD), A planet in an unlikely orbit around a double star 336 light-years away may offer a clue to a mystery closer to home: the hypothesized "Planet Nine.". The ESA-JAXA BepiColombo mission to Mercury blasted off on an Ariane 5 from Europe's Spaceport in Kourou at 01:45:28 GMT on its exciting mission to study the mysteries of the Solar System's innermost planet. This large range arises from the planet's high orbital eccentricity. [84], It is likely that this magnetic field is generated by a dynamo effect, in a manner similar to the magnetic field of Earth. Without an atmosphere to retain that heat at night, temperatures can dip as low as -290°F (-180°C). Mercury is spewed into the air from coal-burning power plants and factories. [140][141][142] Hindu mythology used the name Budha for Mercury, and this god was thought to preside over Wednesday. This would indicate an interaction between the magnetosphere and the planet's surface. 2 Mercury's outer shell, comparable to Earth's outer shell (called the mantle and crust), is only about 400 kilometers (250 miles) thick. In addition to continued observations and mapping of Mercury, MESSENGER observed the 2012 solar maximum. The two most common in favor of colonization are survival of human civilization and the biosphere in the event of a planetary-scale … [131], The ancients knew Mercury by different names depending on whether it was an evening star or a morning star. Very large impact basins, including Caloris (960 miles or 1,550 kilometers in diameter) and Rachmaninoff (190 miles, or 306 kilometers in diameter), were created by asteroid impacts on the planet's surface early in the solar system's history. 14 September 2020 Space The Sun Explore facts about the biggest and hottest object in the solar system. From this distance, it takes sunlight 3.2 minutes to travel from the Sun to Mercury. In the other alternate Mercurian years, the same thing happens at the other of these two points. Reaching Mercury from Earth poses significant technical challenges, because it orbits so much closer to the Sun than Earth. {\displaystyle \epsilon =24\pi ^{3}{\frac {a^{2}}{T^{2}c^{2}(1-e^{2})}}} [189] Launched on October 20, 2018, BepiColombo is expected to reach Mercury in 2025. Mercury can come as near as 82.2 gigametres (0.549 astronomical units; 51.1 million miles) to Earth, and that is slowly declining: The next approach to within 82.1 Gm (51.0 million miles) is in 2679, and to within 82.0 Gm (51.0 million miles) in 4487, but it will not be closer to Earth than 80 Gm (50 million miles) until 28,622. The smallest planet in our solar system and nearest to the Sun, Mercury is only slightly larger than Earth's Moon. [163] This means that Schiaparelli's and Antoniadi's maps were not "wrong". [121][122], Nonetheless, the brightest (full phase) appearance of Mercury is an essentially impossible time for practical observation, because of the extreme proximity of the Sun. NASA's Curiosity Mars rover has started a road trip that will continue through the summer across roughly a mile (1.6 kilometers) of terrain. 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