Mercury's Messenger Survives Solar Radiation Thanks to NASA Glenn Engineers

Engineers at NASA's Glenn Research Center, Cleveland, are excited about the role they played in preparing MESSENGER for its mission to Mercury, the planet closest to the Sun. Members of the Thermal Energy Conversion Branch supported 19 tests for MESSENGER (short for MErcury, Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging) in Glenn's unique solar simulation vacuum facility.

Glenn's support of the project began in 1999, before MESSENGER was selected as a flight mission, when testing was conducted for the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL), Laurel, Md., to verify that solar arrays and thermal shields could survive the intense solar radiation at Mercury.