Ice Water And Organic Materials Detected In Planet Mercury By NASA Spacecraft

NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft has detected big pockets of ice and water in the north polar region of the planet Mercury. The image shows a perspective view of Mercury’s north polar region with the radar-bright regions shown in yellow where water and ice has been detected.

Mercury is the closest planet to the Sun. It orbits the Sun from a distance of 46,000,000 to 70,000,000 kilometers (29,000,000 to 43,000,000 miles) and takes 88 days to complete one. Without an atmosphere to retain heat, the surface of the planet fluctuates. Mercury can reach to temperatures up to 700 Kelvin (K) which is hot enough to melt lead but there are areas that have temperatures as low as 50 K. 0 K is absolute zero.

Despite this, there are areas in the planet that are shielded from the Sun's heat. These are located in the polar regions of the planet. It is in these areas that NASA's MESSENGER (MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry and Ranging) spacecraft have discovered "evidence of big pockets of ice... from a latitude of 85 degrees north up to the pole, with smaller deposits scattered as far away as 65 degrees north..."