Although Mercury is already the smallest planet in our solar system, scientists at NASA just discovered that it might be getting even smaller. In a recent press release, NASA suggested that Mercury is an active planet, with shifting tectonics like Earth, and is contracting.
NASA arrived at this hypothesis after the Messenger spacecraft observed small fault scarps, or landforms, that looked like they had just recently formed. "These scarps are small enough that scientists believe they must be geologically young, which means Mercury is still contracting and that Earth is not the only tectonically active planet in our solar system, as previously thought," the organization wrote in a press release.
Though the small, colorful planet frequently gets blamed for life's woes when it's in retrograde, these recent findings should not be alarming, as our own planet tends to shift and move as well.
Mercury Might Not Be in Retrograde, but It Is Shrinking originally seen at http://www.popsugar.com
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