The joint European-Japanese BepiColombo spacecraft has captured some of the clearest images of Mercury's north pole and northern regions during its latest flyby. The images, released by the European Space Agency (ESA), reveal the planet's stark division between sunlight and darkness, shadowed crater regions, and expansive volcanic plains.
Since launching in 2018, the joint European-Japanese BepiColombo spacecraft has flown by Mercury six times, using eachto reduce its speed and adjust its flight path to make it easier to get into orbit. While the mission’s main scientific instruments haven’t yet been put to use, the spacecraft’s monitoring cameras have given us some of the clearest views we’ve ever had of the Swift Planet.
The image above, taken over the planet’s north pole, shows the clear division between sunlight and darkness on Mercury, which researchers call the terminator line. Mercury has some of the hottest temperatures in the solar system where sunlight falls on its scorched surface, but it also has some of the coldest, in craters that are permanently shadowed by their rims.Some of these shadowed crater regions can be seen lying along the terminator line in the image.
Bepicolombo Mercury Spacecraft ESA Solar System
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BepiColombo spacecraft flies by Mercury, sees volcanic plain and impact cratersKiona Smith is a science writer based in the Midwest, where they write about space and archaeology. They've written for Inverse, Ars Technica, Forbes and authored the book, Peeing and Pooping in Space: A 100% Factual Illustrated History. They attended Texas A&M University and have a degree in anthropology.
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