银河说-171211期：“信使”号镜头下的水星[附4K超清视频下载

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“信使”号镜头下的水星

说明：飞越水星会看到什么？这个问题可以由美国国家航空航天局（NASA）的“信使”号探测器（Messenger）来回答。该探测器在2011年到2015年间绕行水星时采集了一系列影像和数据，将这些影像和数据稍加整合，便能模拟飞越水星时所能看到的炽热的水星表面，如上方视频所示。“信使”号探测器有许多新发现。总的来说，这颗太阳系最内围的行星酷似绕行地球的月亮，其灰色表面同样是坑洼遍布。另外，视频中水星两极附近的阴影处很可能是水冰。视频从水星的向阳面切入，在虚拟探测器退回水星阴面时结束。不同于视频所显示的是，水星的自转速度其实非常慢，绕太阳公转2次时才自转完3圈。2018年，欧洲和日本计划发射“比皮科伦坡”号水星探测器(BepiColombo)，以接手“信使”号留下的工作，进一步勘测水星表面并对其磁场进行探测。

译：银河说翻译组 飞果

Mercury Visualized from MESSENGER
Video Credit: NASA, JHUAPL, CIW; Processing: Roman Tkachenko;

Music: Open Sea Morning by Puddle of Infinity

Explanation: What would it be like to fly over the planet Mercury? Images and data taken from NASA’s robotic MESSENGER spacecraft that orbited Mercury from 2011 to 2015 have been digitally combined to envision a virtual flight that highlights much of the hot planet’s surface. In general, the Solar System’s innermost world appears similar to Earth’s Moon as it is covered by a heavily cratered gray terrain. MESSENGER discovered much about Mercury including that shadows near its poles likely host water ice. The featured video opens as Mercury is viewed from the Sun-facing side and concludes with the virtual spacecraft retreating into Mercury’s night. Mercury actually rotates so slowly that it only completes three rotations for every two trips around the Sun. In 2018, Europe and Japan plan to launch BepiColombo to better map Mercury’s surface and probe its magnetic field.

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滴溜溜的水星。