Mercury's mysterious 'darkness' revealed
Monday, March 7, 2016 - 13:00
in Earth & Climate
Scientists have long been puzzled by Mercury's very dark surface. Previously, scientists proposed that the darkness came from carbon accumulated by comet impacts. Now scientists confirm that carbon is present at Mercury's surface, but that it most likely originated deep below the surface, in the form of a now-disrupted and buried ancient graphite-rich crust, which was later brought to the surface via impacts after most of the current crust formed.