The crater shown here, Boëthius, is 115 km (71 mi.) in diameter. We have seen Boëthius before, when it was imaged by MESSENGER during its second flyby. Named for the early sixth-century Roman philosopher, Boethius has been filled with smooth plains that may be volcanic in origin. After that infilling, compressional stresses that are pervasive across the entire planet's surface resulted in the formation of the prominent lobate scarp that runs from top to bottom in the image. Boethius is yet another example of the Law of Superposition, which helps scientists to determine the sequence of events at any given location on Mercury.

This image was acquired as a high-resolution targeted observation. Targeted observations are images of a small area on Mercury's surface at resolutions much higher than the 200-meter/pixel morphology base map. It is not possible to cover all of Mercury's surface at this high resolution, but typically several areas of high scientific interest are imaged in this mode each week.

Date acquired: February 1, 2014
Image Mission Elapsed Time (MET): 33546022
Image ID: 5678647
Instrument: Narrow Angle Camera (NAC) of the Mercury Dual Imaging System (MDIS)
Center Latitude: 0.91° S
Center Longitude: 286.88° E
Resolution: 76 meters/pixel
Scale: The scene is 75 km (47 mi.) across
Incidence Angle: 72.8°
Emission Angle: 6.2°
Phase Angle: 66.6°
North is to the bottom in this image

The MESSENGER spacecraft is the first ever to orbit the planet Mercury, and the spacecraft's seven scientific instruments and radio science investigation are unraveling the history and evolution of the Solar System's innermost planet. MESSENGER acquired over 150,000 images and extensive other data sets. MESSENGER is capable of continuing orbital operations until early 2015.

For information regarding the use of images, see the MESSENGER image use policy.