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Davies (crater)

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Davies is a crater on Mars located at 46°N 0°E on the fringe of Acidalia Planitia near Arabia Terra. It is approximately 47 km in diameter.

Davies crater was named in honor of Merton Davies (1917-2001), a pioneer in the cartography of planetary bodies. An employee of the Rand Corporation, he assisted NASA in mapping Mars with colleagues Gérard de Vaucouleurs and Harold Masursky and defined the prime meridian of Mars as passing through the crater Airy-0. Davies crater lies on the prime meridian.

The name Davies has only been provisionally accepted by the International Astronomical Union and will not be official until the 2006 meeting of the IAU.