Carnegie hosts Mercury crater-naming contest

The MESSENGER Education and Public Outreach (EPO) Team is launching a competition this week to name five impact craters on Mercury. The contest is open to all Earthlings, except for members of the mission’s EPO team. The contest runs from 15th December 2014 to 15th January 2015.

NASA’s MESSENGER spacecraft has been in orbit about Mercury since March 2011. The mission’s EPO team is led by Julie Edmonds of the Carnegie Institution for Science.

According to the International Astronomical Union (IAU) — the governing body of planetary and satellite nomenclature since 1919 — all new craters on Mercury must be named after an artist, composer, or writer who was famous for more than 50 years and has been dead for more than three years. See the current list of named Mercury craters.

http://astronomynow.com/2014/12/16/carnegie-hosts-mercury-crater-naming-contest/

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