Date acquired: May 05, 2011
Image Mission Elapsed Time (MET): 213113264
Image ID: 216718
Instrument: Wide Angle Camera (WAC) of the Mercury Dual Imaging System (MDIS)
WAC filter: 7 (748 nanometers)
Center Latitude: 8.25°
Center Longitude: 325.8° E
Resolution: 172 meters/pixel
Scale: Yeats is about 92 kilometers in diameter
Incidence Angle: 77.6°
Emission Angle: 18.7°
Phase Angle: 96.3°

Of Interest: This image is dominated by the 92-km diameter crater Yeats, named for William Butler Yeats. Yeats the man was an Irish poet and dramatist (winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1923) who lived from 1865 to 1939. Yeats the crater exhibits radially textured ejecta, wall terraces, and bright central peaks. A lobate scarp crosses the floor from the 1 o'clock to 7 o'clock position.

This image was acquired as part of MDIS's high-resolution surface morphology base map. The surface morphology base map will cover more than 90% of Mercury's surface with an average resolution of 250 meters/pixel (0.16 miles/pixel or 820 feet/pixel). Images acquired for the surface morphology base map typically have off-vertical Sun angles (i.e., high incidence angles) and visible shadows so as to reveal clearly the topographic form of geologic features.

The MESSENGER spacecraft is the first ever to orbit the planet Mercury, and the spacecraft's seven scientific instruments and radio science investigation are unraveling the history and evolution of the Solar System's innermost planet. Visit the Why Mercury? section of this website to learn more about the key science questions that the MESSENGER mission is addressing. During the one-year primary mission, MDIS is scheduled to acquire more than 75,000 images in support of MESSENGER's science goals.

Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington

For information regarding the use of MESSENGER images, see the image use policy.