PIA19413: Wrinkles on Mercury
This image mosaic from NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft shows an unnamed ridge in the northern volcanic plains of Mercury. Wrinkle ridges like this are interpreted to be tectonic in origin and are usually only found in volcanic plains.
 Target Name:  Mercury
 Is a satellite of:  Sol (our sun)
 Mission:  MESSENGER 
 Spacecraft:  MESSENGER
 Instrument:  Mercury Dual Imaging System (MDIS) 
 Product Size:  1979 x 887 pixels (w x h) 
 Produced By:  Johns Hopkins University/APL 
 Full-Res TIFF:  PIA19413.tif (1.759 MB)
 Full-Res JPEG:  PIA19413.jpg (423.3 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:

This image mosaic shows an unnamed ridge in the northern volcanic plains of Mercury. Wrinkle ridges like this are interpreted to be tectonic in origin and are usually only found in volcanic plains. Six individual MDIS images are part of this mosaic.

Instruments: Mercury Dual Imaging System (MDIS)
Latitude: 79°
Longitude: 118° E
Scale: The ridge is approximately 140 kilometers (87 miles) long

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. In the mission's more than four years of orbital operations, MESSENGER has acquired over 250,000 images and extensive other data sets. MESSENGER's highly successful orbital mission is about to come to an end, as the spacecraft runs out of propellant and the force of solar gravity causes it to impact the surface of Mercury in April 2015.

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:
2015-04-16