Real World: Mission to Mercury

Find out about NASA's innovative spacecraft that was launched to explore Mercury. Learn about gravity assist and see what scientists have already learned from the preliminary flybys, including evidence of volcanism and plate tectonics.

Background Information

Grades 6 through 8

• Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory MESSENGER Web Site

Activities

Grades 6 through 8

• Montana State University Design Challenge: How to Keep Gelatin from Melting
• Montana State University Exploring Exploring
• Montana State University Look But Don't Touch: Exploration With Remote Sensing
• Montana State University Mission: Possible - How Can We Plan an Exploration of Another World?
• Montana State University My Angle on Cooling
• Montana State University Sensing the Invisible: The Herschel Experiment
• Montana State University Snow Goggles and Limiting Sunlight

Mathematics

Grades 6 through 8

• SpaceMath@NASA Mercury Surface, Space Envirnoment, Geochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) Math Problems
• National Institute of Aerospace; NASA Goddard Space Flight Center MESSENGER Explores the Planet Mercury and Ratios, Proportions, and Similarity