Dear MEL School’s
Topic Readers,
Wrinkled Mercury's
shrinking history
How much do you
know about Mars? The innermost planet of our solar system is relatively small
with only a little under 5,000km diameter, which is just about one-third of
Earth’s. Since it’s very close to the sun and doesn’t rotate, the temperature of
the permanently-baked-hemisphere is as high as 420 degrees Celsius but the
shaded part goes as cold as 180 degrees below zero. That’s a staggering 600
degrees difference!
What Scientists
have been interested in finding isn’t the temp but the size of the tiny planet
because they believe its radius has shrunk by 7km since it was born four
billions years ago. Is that a big deal? It may not be so for Earth which
diameter is three times as large as the one of Mercury. But for Mercury, that
shrinkage is almost equivalent of 21km for our planet. That sounds a little
substantial, doesn’t it?
Enjoy reading and
learning about the planet that was named after a fast-traveling Greek god.
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