Mercury's Poles Have Water
On November 29, 2012, the
Huffington Post reports that NASA’s Messenger probe has discovered water ice at
the poles of Mercury. These areas of water ice are at impact craters where the
ice never sees the sun. These craters are in shadow regions. Messenger used a
neuron spectroscopy that measures the levels of Hydrogen concentration in order
to find out if there was any water present. Messenger was launched in 2004; it
made three flybys of Mercury between 2008 and 2009 until it entered into
Mercury’s orbit in 2011. 
In the article Torrid Mercury’s icy poles from Astronomy, it says that scientist
for decades have believed that their might be water ice in the corners of the
innermost planets of our sola system. “During the past several decades,
scientists have come to realize that a conspiracy of freak accidents involving
Mercury’s motion and orientation had created small regions on the planet’s
surface where it ought to be cold enough for ice to form and survive for
billions of years”. 40 years ago, however, NASA’s Mariner 10 was not able to
make the same observations that Messenger was able to make. Radar observations
on Earth detected “unusually reflective regions in Mercury’s polar regions”.
Mercury is most likely tidally locked with the Sun and always has the same face
that points towards the Sun.
Sources:
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