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It is the smallest planet in the Solar System, with an equatorial radius of 2,439.7 kilometres (1,516.0 mi). [4] Mercury is also smaller —albeit more massive—than the largest natural satellites in the Solar System, Ganymede and Titan. Mercury consists of approximately 70% metallic and 30% silicate material.
Mariner 10 was an American robotic space probe launched by NASA on 3 November 1973, to fly by the planets Mercury and Venus. It was the first spacecraft to perform flybys of multiple planets. [3] Mariner 10 was launched approximately two years after Mariner 9 and was the last spacecraft in the Mariner program.
The geology of Mercury is the scientific study of the surface, crust, and interior of the planet Mercury. It emphasizes the composition, structure, history, and physical processes that shape the planet. It is analogous to the field of terrestrial geology. In planetary science, the term geology is used in its broadest sense to mean the study of ...
Mercury, being the closest to the Sun, with a weak magnetic field and the smallest mass of the recognized terrestrial planets, has a very tenuous and highly variable atmosphere (surface-bound exosphere) containing hydrogen, helium, oxygen, sodium, calcium, potassium and water vapor, with a combined pressure level of about 10 −14 bar (1 nPa ). [2]
720,000 km/h (450,000 mi/h) [10] Orbital period. ~230 million years [10] The Solar System [d] is the gravitationally bound system of the Sun and the objects that orbit it. [11] It was formed 4.6 billion years ago when a dense region of a molecular cloud collapsed, forming the Sun and a protoplanetary disc.
The eight planets of the Solar System with size to scale (up to down, left to right): Saturn, Jupiter, Uranus, Neptune (outer planets), Earth, Venus, Mars, and Mercury (inner planets) A planet is a large, rounded astronomical body that is neither a star nor its remnant. The best available theory of planet formation is the nebular hypothesis ...
The first probe to visit Mercury was Mariner 10. View of Mercury from Mariner 10 in March 1975. 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.
Mercury's magnetic field is approximately a magnetic dipole (meaning the field has only two magnetic poles) [8] apparently global, [9] on planet Mercury. [10] Data from Mariner 10 led to its discovery in 1974; the spacecraft measured the field's strength as 1.1% that of Earth's magnetic field. [11] The origin of the magnetic field can be ...