Japan And EU Plan Joint Mission To Mercury 32
Devar writes "Japan and the European Space Agency have revealed their plans for a joint mission to Mercury that would be the first to land a probe on its surface. The mission also includes two orbiters to map the surface, all due to be launced in 2010."
Re:Why Mercury? (Score:3, Insightful)
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> This has me on curiosity alone.
I think you just answered your own question: Curiosity alone.
Off the top of my head, the insane spread between day/night temperatures would probably allow us to learn a lot about Mercury's composition by watching the rocks cool.
I'd imagine they can also learn a lot about the sun during the approach and insertion/landing phase.
Not do diss astrobiologists, but hey, there's more to space science than astrobiology.
For instance, if I could break any law of physics I wanted to, I'd take a vacation to admire the view from any planet (not that any planets are likely to have remained in orbit!) around this [govertschilling.nl] star... as it dives to within 17 light-hours of a 2.6-million-solar-mass black hole at 2.5% of the speed of light?