After a successful landing on the moon, India launches a probe to observe the sun | Science and the planet

It is about the launch of Aditya-L1, India’s first space observatory to study the sun. Aditya, “sun” in Hindi, will be placed in a Halo orbit in a strip of space about 1.5 million kilometers from Earth.

The trip will take about four months, and then the spacecraft will remain at the site for research for another five years. Aditya remains close to the Sun all the time, but it is still at a distance of about 149 million km.

Aditya shall send clear pictures of the sun continuously. The spacecraft will contain seven instruments to observe the sun’s outer layers. The goal is to learn more about the characteristics of solar flares, radiation from the Sun, and the dynamics of the solar wind. For example, these phenomena affect nearby satellites and can damage electronics in spacecraft.

NASA and the European European Space Agency have previously launched two space probes to study the sun, but this is the first time in India. The country became known as a space travel nation last week after the successful landing of Chandrayaan-3 on the moon.