Abstract
In 2007, the author published the book Dynamic Planet: Mercury in the Context of its Environment to create a foundation, a snapshot, of then current knowledge and thinking about the planet, for the anticipated influx of new data from the NASA MESSENGER mission. As expected MESSENGER, after three flybys and over two Earth years in orbit around Mercury, has provided the coverage necessary to get a ‘global’ view of the entire planet and its environment. Finally, observations of sufficient resolution and duration, particularly of the northern hemisphere, have created a firm basis for, in most cases, earlier weakly constrained hypotheses or, in some cases, revealed even more dynamic processes that challenge conventional views of the inner Solar System. For example, actual evidence for recent volcanic activity helps to substantiate the hypothesis that Mercury has an internal dynamo and a still partially molten interior to generate its global magnetic field.
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Clark, P. (2015). Background. In: Mercury's Interior, Surface, and Surrounding Environment. SpringerBriefs in Astronomy. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-2244-4_1
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