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We’ve known since the 1970s that the planet Mercury, at one point, was contracting as its core cooled. But we didn’t know if it was still happening…until now.
Scientists from The Open University in the UK have published new research in the journal Nature that indicates that Mercury’s tectonic changes, and specifically compression, are ongoing.
Get a closer look at Mercury as the spacecraft sweeps across the surface.
The team analyzed images taken by NASA’s Mercury Surface, Space Environment, Geochemistry and Ranging (MESSENGER) mission that orbited Mercury from 2011 to 2015. They noticed a depression in the grounds that usually appears along a fault. The surface of the planet is stretched or compressed and this is a clear indication that the planet was still changing in size when the images were taken.
The key finding was that these shallow valleys were not affected by debris such as meteorites, which would have left craters on the planet’s surface, and the grabens themselves. Because of this, the Open University research team estimated that the grabens in the images were about 300 million years old. This may seem like an incredibly long time ago, but considering that the thermal contraction of Mercury began about 3 billion years ago, it is relatively recent.
It will be at least two more years until we learn more about Mercury’s transition surface because of a joint mission between the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), according to Space.com. The mission will enter the planet’s orbit. At the end of 2025
