Mercury with exaggerated topography scaled one in sixty million

Originally published here: Mercury with exaggerated topography scaled one in sixty million by tato_713 - Thingiverse

This model was made using MATLAB R2016a with the data from the MESSENGER mission available in the USGS site. The relief is exaggerated in order to make it more visible.

The file's names explained: name_1_x_10_y.stl is 1 : x* 10^y. So _1_6_10_7 is 1:600000000 or one in 60 million. 

Mercury

Mercury is the closest planet to the Sun. It has nearly the same density as Earth, but smaller and uncompressed. This is because is has a comparatively bigger iron nucleus. Mercury is sometime consider the prototype of an iron planet, a planet composed mainly in iron. Its rotation is synchronous with its orbit un a 3:2 lock, meaning that it makes 3 rotation (58.7 Earth's days each one) every 2 orbits (88 Earth's days each one)). If you were in the surface the Sun will move in the sky so slow that a solar day in Mercury last 2 Mercury's years.

• Type: Planet. 
• Orbit: Sun. 
• Orbital period: 87.969 d. 
• Rotational period: 58.646 d. 
• Composition: Rocky, mostly iron core. 
• Density: 5.427 g/cm3. 
• Dimensions: 4880 km 
• Model scale: 1:2x107 (24cm) 1:6x107 (8cm) 1:1.2x108 (4cm)

References

• https://astrogeology.usgs.gov/search/map/Mercury/Topography/MESSENGER/Mercury\_Messenger\_USGS\_DEM\_Global\_665m\_v2
• Surf to STL function for MATLAB 

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