Following the successful Chandrayaan-3 mission to the moon, ISRO announced on Monday that Aditya-L1, India’s first solar mission to study the sun, will launch from the Sriharikota spaceport at 11.50 am on September 2.
The Aditya-L1 spacecraft is designed to provide remote observations of the corona and in situ observations of the solar wind at L1 (the Sun-Earth Lagrangian point) approximately 1.5 million kilometers from Earth.
Lagrangian points are locations in space where the gravitational forces of the sun and Earth create regions of enhanced attraction and repulsion. According to NASA, spacecraft can use these to reduce the fuel consumption needed to stay in place. Lagrange points are named after Italian-French mathematician Joseph-Louis Lagrange.
The spacecraft, India’s first space observatory to study the sun, will be launched using a PSLV-C57 rocket, the Bengaluru-based space agency said in a social media post.
The Aditya-L1 mission, designed to study the Sun from orbit around L1, will carry seven payloads to observe the photosphere, chromosphere and corona (the outermost layer of the Sun) at different wavelengths.
An official of the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) said that Aditya-L1 is a fully indigenous effort with the participation of national agencies.
The Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA) in Bangalore is the lead agency in developing the Visible Emission Line Coronagraph (VELC) payload, while the Inter-University Center for Astronomy and Astrophysics in Pune has developed the Solar Ultraviolet Imaging Telescope (SUIT) effective Load for mission.
According to ISRO, the goal of VELC is to gather data to address how the temperature of the corona reaches about 1 million degrees, while the sun’s surface itself remains above 6,000 degrees Celsius.
Aditya-L1 can provide observations of the corona and solar chromosphere with an ultraviolet payload, and observations of flares with an X-ray payload. Particle detector and magnetometer payloads can provide information about charged particles and magnetic fields reaching orbits in the halo around L1.
Developed by the Ulao Satellite Centre, the satellite arrived at ISRO’s Sriharikota spaceport in Andhra Pradesh earlier this month.
It is planned to be placed in a halo orbit around the L1 point of the Sun-Earth system.
ISRO noted that the main advantage of satellites placed in halo orbits around the L1 point is continuous observation of the sun without any planetary occlusion or solar eclipse. “This will provide greater advantages in real-time observations of solar activity and its impact on space weather,” it said.
Taking advantage of the special vantage point of L1, 4 payloads will directly observe the Sun, and the remaining 3 payloads are expected to conduct in situ studies of particles and fields at the L1 point, thereby providing important scientific research on the propagation effects of solar dynamics. interplanetary medium.
“The SUIT of the Aditya L1 payload is expected to provide the most important information to understand issues such as coronal heating, coronal mass ejections (CMEs), pre-flare and flare activity and their characteristics, space weather dynamics, propagation of particles and fields, etc., ’ said the Indian Space Research Organization.
The main science objectives of the Aditya-L1 mission are to: study the dynamics of the Sun’s upper atmosphere (chromosphere and corona); study chromosphere and coronal heating, physics of partially ionized plasmas, initiation of coronal mass ejections and flares; observe in situ The particle and plasma environment, providing data for the study of solar particle dynamics; and the physics of the corona and its heating mechanisms.
In addition, the mission aims to study the diagnostics of coronal and coronal loop plasmas: temperature, velocity and density; development, dynamics and origin of CMEs; determine the sequence of processes occurring in multiple Events leading to solar eruptions; magnetic field topology and magnetic field measurements in the corona; and drivers of space weather (origin, composition, and dynamics of the solar wind).
Aditya-L1’s instruments are tuned to observe the solar atmosphere, primarily the chromosphere and corona. In situ instruments will observe the local environment at point L1.
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