The first solar observatory of India has successfully reached its intended orbit, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) announced over the weekend, as India strengthens its position as an emerging space superpower.
India’s Aditya-L1 spacecraft launched from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, India, on September 2, 2023. (Photo: R. Parthibhan/AP).
The Aditya-L1 spacecraft has safely arrived at Lagrange Point L1, a location in space with an unobstructed view of the sun, approximately 1.5 million kilometers from Earth, paving the way for scientists to enhance their studies of solar and terrestrial interactions.
Launched on September 2, Aditya-L1’s mission came less than two weeks after ISRO’s historic landing of the Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft on the Moon’s South Pole.
The spacecraft is equipped with seven scientific instruments, four of which will be directly trained on the sun, while the remaining three will study solar wind particles and magnetic fields at Lagrange Point L1.
The primary objectives of the mission include researching the sun’s upper atmosphere and various solar phenomena, such as coronal mass ejections—massive releases of plasma from the sun’s outer layer.
The data collected from Aditya-L1’s experiments will provide a clearer picture of space weather, a term used to describe the propagation of solar waves throughout our solar system.
India’s Aditya-L1 will contribute to the body of information gathered from missions designed to study the sun, including NASA’s active Parker Solar Probe launched in 2021, which was the first spacecraft to “touch” the sun.
