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MESSENGER was a NASA robotic space probe that orbited the planet Mercury between 2011 and 2015, studying Mercury's chemical composition, geology, and magnetic field. The name is a backronym for "Mercury Surface, Space Environment, Geochemistry, and Ranging", and a reference to the messenger god Mercury from Roman mythology.
The exploration of Mercury has a minor role in the space interests of the world. It is the least explored inner planet. [1] As of 2015, the Mariner 10 and MESSENGER missions have been the only missions that have made close observations of Mercury. MESSENGER made three flybys before entering orbit around Mercury. [2]
Mercury is the first planet from the Sun and the smallest in the Solar System. In English, it is named after the ancient Roman god Mercurius ( Mercury ), god of commerce and communication, and the messenger of the gods. Mercury is classified as a terrestrial planet, with roughly the same surface gravity as Mars.
A lunar eclipse as viewed from Mercury, captured from the MESSENGER spacecraft. The Moon can be seen falling into the shadow of Earth. The Earth and the Moon also will be very bright, their apparent magnitudes being about −5 [3] and −1.2, respectively. The maximum apparent distance between the Earth and the Moon is about 15′.
The original QuickCam was developed by Connectix in 1994 for nationwide commercial sale and was the first widely marketed webcam-like device, although its original advertising did not use the term "webcam" or refer to the World Wide Web, then in its infancy. Video conferencing via computers already existed at the time, and client-server based ...
Mercury is the closest planet to the Sun and lacks any natural satellites. An undiscovered moon orbiting the planet was hypothesized to exist in the early 1970s, but it turned out to be misinterpreted data from the star 31 Crateris. [1] Observation of a moon of Mercury from Earth would be difficult because Mercury is relatively close to the Sun ...
MESSENGER. ) The Solar System Family Portrait is an image of many of the Solar System 's planets and moons acquired by MESSENGER during November 2010 from approximately the orbit of Mercury. The mosaic is intended to be complementary to the Voyager 1 ' s Family Portrait acquired from the outer edge of the Solar System on February 14, 1990. [1]
Following the arrival of MESSENGER in orbit in 2011, these six quadrangles were mapped and renamed. The base mosaic used in the new maps was produced with orbital images by the MESSENGER Team and released by NASA’s Planetary Data System on March 8, 2013. This global mosaic includes 100% coverage of Mercury’s surface.