The planet Mercury, closest to the Sun, still surprises astronomers with its extremes.
Her day lasts longer than a year. The side facing the luminary is hot, and the opposite side is immersed in incredible cold, according to Universe Today.
Mercury remains one of the least studied and most obscure planets in our system. Although it possesses solid dry land like Earth, Venus and Mars, the amount of iron in its interior is significantly higher than that of its "neighbors".
The analysis showed that the core of Mercury is about 42% of the volume (for the Earth - 17%). There are two theories to explain this phenomenon. According to the first, a large core with a huge iron content was formed from the very beginning. Proximity to the Sun could cause a situation where metals condensed inside the planet, and rocky rocks were pushed out. Either Mercury arose elsewhere, richer in metals, and then somehow took its place in the system.
The second theory says that the mantle of Mercury was originally much larger, and the size of the core was proportional to it. But as a result of some kind of cataclysm, the planet has lost part of the shell.
Scientists from the University of Zurich decided to test the second option. They created several scenarios to choose the most plausible, taking into account both possible collisions with larger objects and the cooling of the planet itself.
It turned out that the formation of Mercury in its current form as a result of impacts from the outside is possible, but not very likely. The final result is influenced by many factors: the state of the planet itself before the cataclysm, the composition of the "striking element", location, power and even the angle of collision.
Space accidents in the young solar system were not uncommon. It was they who caused the appearance of the moon, retrograde rotation of Venus and the extreme tilt of the axis of Uranus. But whether this happened to Mercury - scientists could neither prove nor disprove.
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It is important to note that to date, scientists have discovered only a few exoplanets like Mercury. Perhaps the formation of objects of this type is an extremely rare phenomenon in the Universe.
Scientists have previously concluded that the craters of Mercury may be filled with ice. Consequently, the planet's water reserves are much more voluminous than previously thought.