Like all planets, Mercury is a world of extremes, but not necessarily in meaningful ways. Its iron core is inexplicably and inexplicably huge. Despite the scorching temperatures, ice is trapped at the poles. In addition, the Earth is attacked every day by intense solar storms that only occur once every 100 years.
Through her work as a co-investigator on the European-Japanese BepiColombo mission, Susie Inbar hopes to help us learn a little more about our planet. The BepiColombo mission made its final and closest flight to Mercury last week, helping slow the planet before it enters. Inbar, a space weather expert based at the University of Leicester in the UK, said the Mercury study could help prepare for the worst solar storms here. Earth. She was also the winner of the BBC show in 2017. Astronaut: Do you have what you need?Gauntlet, which pits contestants against the rigors of space travel.
Inbar said. new scientist Why she's so excited about sending a mission to Mercury, what we want to know about this interesting planet, and whether she herself might someday venture into the final frontier.
Jonathan O'Callaghan: Why are we returning to Mercury now?
Susie Imber: There are many reasons. From a high-level perspective, it's a fairly unexplored planet. We've had three flybys and one orbital mission (NASA's Messenger, which orbited from 2011 to 2015), but the more we know…
Source: www.newscientist.com