Planet Mercury has revealed an astonishing discovery made by scientists who did not believe that their observations would reveal something that seemed completely impossible, but in fact turns out to be real. It seems that the planet Mercury managed to retain a good part of the heat emitted by its core, and experienced a much reduced contraction than what was initially thought, and this changes a lot about what we knew about the cosmic body .
Planet Mercury it is the closest to the sun, and the smallest planet with a surface consisting mainly of "rocky" areas, but it is not quite as inactive as scientists thought. They have drawn the conclusion for some time that the planet Mercury would have become inactive a long time ago, but it seems that there is still enough activity inside it, and everything was revealed by NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft.
Planet Mercury: AMAZING Discovery, Nobody Believed It
Planet Mercury it would have recorded a contact, from formation until now, of only 2-4 kilometers, instead of 14 kilometers, as scientists thought, the difference being huge for a planet. This smaller reduction in the diameter of the planet Mercury indicates that it has kept more of the heat generated by its core, than was believed until now, the discovery being an impressive one that should be further analyzed.
"It flies in the face of conventional wisdom that a body the size of Mercury, the smallest rocky planet in our solar system, did not cool and become geologically inactive long ago. Somehow, Mercury managed to insulate its interior and slowed the loss of heat that provides the driving force for geological activity. Early in the orbital phase of the mission we discovered that the images that were acquired were not optimal for detecting fault scarps on Mercury."
Planet Mercury had the first theories regarding its contraction formulated on the basis of images recorded by spacecraft sent by NASA in its orbit in 1978 and 2015, but more recent ones show a different story. It seems that the scientists who formulated the first theories did not have access to high-resolution images of the surface of the planet Mercury, but now things are different, and most likely other surprises will come soon.
Planet Mercury it will be visited from 2025 by the BepiColombo spacecraft, and the images recorded by it will reveal even more of the secrets that the cosmic body hides.
