PIA14823: The Whole of the Moon
The image of the Moon (left) is a mosaic of images from NASA's Clementine. The Mercury image (right) is a NASA Mariner 10 mosaic.
 Target Name:  Mercury
 Is a satellite of:  Sol (our sun)
 Mission:  Clementine 
MESSENGER 
Mariner Venus Mercury (Mariner 10) 
 Spacecraft:  Clementine
Mariner 10
 Product Size:  1248 x 624 pixels (w x h) 
 Produced By:  Johns Hopkins University/APL 
 Full-Res TIFF:  PIA14823.tif (779.8 kB)
 Full-Res JPEG:  PIA14823.jpg (103.9 kB)  

Click on the image above to download a moderately sized image in JPEG format (possibly reduced in size from original)

Original Caption Released with Image:

These images show Mercury and the nearside of the Moon at their correct relative brightness. On average, the surface of Mercury is about 15% darker at visible wavelengths than is the nearside of the Moon. This is perplexing to planetary scientists because Mercury's surface is lower in iron, the element in lunar rocks that contributes most to absorbing light. MESSENGER observations will help to solve this puzzle.

Instrument: The image of the Moon is a mosaic of images from Clementine. The Mercury image is a Mariner 10 mosaic.
Scale: The diameter of the Moon is 3468 km; Mercury's diameter is 4880 km.

These images are from MESSENGER, a NASA Discovery mission to conduct the first orbital study of the innermost planet, Mercury. For information regarding the use of images, see the MESSENGER image use policy.

Image Credit:
NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington

Image Addition Date:
2011-09-26