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Mercury May Have Molten Hot Magma at its Core

mattatwork writes "According to ScienceDaily, NASA has come to the conclusion that the planet Mercury may have a molten core after all, based on high-precision planetary radar readings. You may (or may not) remember the Mariner 10 probe making 3 passes by Mercury between March 29th, 1974, September 21st 1974 and March 16, 1975."

8 of 120 comments (clear)

  1. Hmm, Mercury Bar by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Buy the new Mercury Bar, with a molten caramel core!

    No more hard frozen Mars Bars. Let the chocolatey warmth flow through you.

  2. Tautology by BungaDunga · · Score: 5, Funny

    "Magma: Molten rock beneath the surface of the earth." http://www.google.com/search?q=define%3A+magma "Molten hot magma" If it's magma, it's molten, molten rock is pretty much definately hot.

  3. liquid core but little magnetism by wizardforce · · Score: 5, Insightful

    it is quite odd that mercury has a liquid metal core but a very weak magnetic field- planetary magnetic fields form when currents flow through a liquid core- the rotating core sustains the field as on earth, the sun and jupiter but mercury's is very weak- apparently it isn't rotating much

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    Sigs are too short to say anything truly profound so read the above post instead.
  4. Magma in Mercury... by racecarj · · Score: 4, Funny

    This is compared with the recent discovery of mud-like sludge in the core of Uranus.

  5. Magma... by Radi-0-head · · Score: 4, Funny

    You know, Scott. I've been a frickin' evil doctor for 30 frickin' years, OK? Cut me some "frickin'" slack. You forget Scott. We're in a volcano. We're surrounded by liquid hot magma.

  6. Re:neat by bulliver · · Score: 5, Funny

    McDonalds jokes are a medium rarely well done.

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    Support the mob or mysteriously disappear.
  7. Alliteration by sirkha · · Score: 4, Funny

    Shouldn't the title be, "Mercury May Mask a Molten Middle"?

  8. Re:Good news for us I guess... by Josh+Booth · · Score: 4, Informative

    Don't listen to this guy. Mercury is not tidally locked with the sun, but rotates very slowly at about 3 rotations for every 2 revolutions around the sun. And even more, an ocean does not act as any sort of a buffer against gravitational forces from the sun. There's just not a significant enough amount of water even on Earth to do so.