New Morphological Catalog of the Craters of Mercury

Abstract

A new Morphological Catalog of Mercury’s Craters was created at the Sternberg State Astronomical Institute, Moscow State University, together with the Moscow State University of Geodesy and Cartography based on data from the MESSENGER spacecraft. This catalog includes information on the coordinates, diameters, and morphology of 12 365 craters with diameters ≥10 km. The catalog was created using data from the Mercury Crater Catalog, prepared at Brown University (United States), and a global mosaic of Mercury surface images based on data from the MESSENGER spacecraft. Analysis of the new Morphological Catalog has shown that most Mercury craters with a diameter of ≥10 km have a smoothed or partially destroyed rim and a flat floor. The article provides a detailed description of the morphological features of Mercury’s craters. Table 1 shows the percentage of craters with certain features on Mercury and the Moon. It turned out that there are significantly more well-preserved craters on the Moon than on Mercury. Most of Mercury’s craters have terraces and collapses on their inner slopes (65%, compared to 7% of lunar craters). The ratio of craters with different degrees of preservation of the rim, craters with terraces and faults depending on the diameters is presented in detail.