Water ice confirmed on Mercury
NOV 30, 2012
DOI: 10.1063/PT.5.026575
Nature : New evidence of water on Mercury has surfaced, according to three reports published in Science. One team of researchers, using IR laser pulses, has identified bright regions that they believe indicate water ice, inside nine craters near the planet’s north pole; a second team , using thermal modeling based on data collected by the Messenger spacecraft, has located ultracold spots that line up perfectly with those bright regions; and a third team , also using Messenger data, has spotted hydrogen, another indicator of water ice, in the same areas. The researchers suggest that any water on Mercury probably came from comets or asteroids that struck its surface. The reason the water ice ended up in frigid craters at the pole could be that, over time, it migrated there from the blistering hot surface through a process of vaporization and precipitation.
© 2012 American Institute of Physics
