Planet Mercury is shrinking

eFluxMedia

NASA revealed images sent by its MESSENGER probe in January, when it snapped up some 1,200 photos taken from some 120 miles from the planet's surface. MESSENGER, the MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry and Ranging spacecraft launched by NASA in 2004, raced past Mercury on January 14 in the first visit in almost 33 years to the mysterious small planet, in the first of four sweeps over Mercury by the probe. Now, scientists have analyzed these unprecedented images and have come up with 11 papers published yesterday, July 3, in Science. It appears that the innermost planet of our solar system has shrunk by more than a mile in diameter over its history. It appears that the planet's metal core is still active, but its cooling causes the upper-most layers to solidify and sink into the molten layers below...