NASA Contest: How You Can Name a Crater on Mercury

— -- NASA is asking for the public's help to name five craters on the surface of Mercury, however there's a catch to securing cosmic naming rights.

Launched to honor NASA's MESSENGER mission to the solar system's inner-most planet, the contest will consider only names of artists who were famous for at least five decades and have been dead for at least three years, the space agency announced.

People interested in naming a crater can submit their choices on the contest website until Jan. 15. After that, the top choices will be sent to the International Astronomical Union, the group that manages naming of otherworldly features.

MESSENGER has been in orbit for a decade and has traveled more than 8 billion miles during that time.

In March 2011, it became first spacecraft to orbit Mercury, sending back new insights about the planet closest to the sun.

Among the discoveries were deposits of water ice within the craters that are shielded from the burning rays of the sun and a better understanding of how Mercury's surface has been changed by volcanoes and massive eruptions of lava.