A Color View of the Solar System's Innermost Planet

Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington, Posted on: Wednesday, 4 November 2009, 07:04 CST Download full size image

As MESSENGER approached Mercury for the mission's third and final flyby of the Solar System's innermost planet, the WAC acquired images through all 11 of its narrow-band color filters. The 1000, 700, and 430 nanometer filters were combined in red, green, and blue to create this color image, the last close-up color view that will be acquired until MESSENGER goes into orbit around Mercury in March of 2011. Only 6% of Mercury's surface in this image had not been viewed previously by spacecraft, and most of the measurements made by MESSENGER's other instruments during this flyby were made prior to closest approach. The observations from MESSENGER's third flyby of Mercury nonetheless revealed fresh surprises.

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