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Mercury is one of four terrestrial planets in the Solar System, which means it is a rocky body like Earth. It is the smallest planet in the Solar System, with an equatorial radius of 2,439.7 kilometres (1,516.0 mi). [4] Mercury is also smaller—albeit more massive—than the largest natural satellites in the Solar System, Ganymede and Titan.
Parts-per-million chart of the relative mass distribution of the Solar System, each cubelet denoting 2 × 10 24 kg. This article includes a list of the most massive known objects of the Solar System and partial lists of smaller objects by observed mean radius. These lists can be sorted according to an object's radius and mass and, for the most ...
Solar system diagram by Emanuel Bowen in 1747, when neither Uranus, Neptune, nor the asteroid belts had yet been discovered. Orbits of planets are to scale, but the orbits of moons and the sizes of bodies are not. The term "Solar System" entered the English language by 1704, when John Locke used it to refer to the Sun, planets, and comets. [288]
Mercury in the Solar System has a metallic core equal to 60–70% of its planetary mass, and is sometimes called an iron planet, [36] though its surface is made of silicates and is iron-poor. Iron planets are thought to form in the high-temperature regions close to a star, like Mercury, and if the protoplanetary disk is rich in iron. Icy planet
Mercury – smallest and innermost planet in the Solar System. Its orbital period (about 88 Earth days) is less than any other planet in the Solar System. Seen from Earth, it appears to move around its orbit in about 116 days. It has no known natural satellites. It is named after the Roman deity Mercury, the messenger to the gods.
Scientists analyzed famed astronomer Johannes Kepler’s 1607 sketches of sunspots to solve a mystery about the sun’s solar cycle that has persisted for centuries.
"Inferior planet" refers to Mercury and Venus, which are closer to the Sun than Earth is. "Superior planet" refers to Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune (the latter two added later), which are further from the Sun than Earth is. The terms are sometimes used more generally; for example, Earth is an inferior planet relative to Mars.
Mercury and Venus, the closest planets to the Sun, similarly exhibit very slow rotation: Mercury is tidally locked into a 3:2 spin–orbit resonance (rotating three times for every two revolutions around the Sun), [84] and Venus's rotation may be in equilibrium between tidal forces slowing it down and atmospheric tides created by solar heating ...