Mercury is the smallest planet in the solar system — it is only slightly larger than Earth's moon. Since it has no significant atmosphere to stop impacts, the planet is pockmarked with craters.

If you buy through a BGR link, we may earn an affiliate commission, helping support our expert product labs. The amount of mercury in our atmosphere is a little out of hand, and scientists may ...

Researchers estimated that before humans started pumping mercury into the atmosphere, it contained on average about 580 megagrams of mercury. However, in 2015, independent research that looked at ...

Mercury (Hg) is a naturally occurring element found across the globe, yet it becomes highly toxic as it accumulates up the food chain. Pollution from human activities has pumped increasing amounts of ...

Researchers found that atmospheric mercury levels have decreased by almost 70% in the last 20 years, mainly because human-caused emissions have been reduced.

The convention’s effectiveness is judged partly on the amount of mercury in the atmosphere. Gaseous elemental mercury is also released from its largest natural reservoir, the soil, which might be ...

How hot is Mercury? Mercury's sun-facing side is scorched by temperatures of around 430°C, hot enough to melt lead. Without a substantial atmosphere to distribute heat away from the areas facing the ...

Mercury pollution levels in the Earth's atmosphere have spiked by seven times since the modern era began around 1500 CE, new research shows. The work, published as a study in the journal ...

Credit: ESA/BepiColombo/MTM Plus, the situation doesn’t get any easier once you’re near Mercury. There’s no atmosphere to help a spacecraft slow down like there is at Venus or Mars.

Mercury is the first planet in our solar system, closest to the sun, so its daytime temperatures can rise to 800 degrees Fahrenheit. It has no atmosphere, so nighttime temperatures can drop as low ...

The convention’s effectiveness is judged partly on the amount of mercury in the atmosphere. Gaseous elemental mercury is also released from its largest natural reservoir, the soil, which might ...