Aditya L1 Mission

Context

∙ Recently, ISRO performed a crucial maneuver to bind Aditya-L1 into L1 orbit.

What is the Aditya-L1 mission?

∙ Aditya-L1 is the first space-based Indian observatory to study the Sun.

∙ The solar mission will not see the spacecraft actually go to the sun, it will instead create a space observatory at a point from which the sun can be observed even during an eclipse.

∙ The spacecraft will be placed in a halo orbit around the Lagrange point 1 (L1), around 1.5 million km from the Earth, of the Sun-Earth system.

∙ The mission has a life of five years during which its payloads are expected to provide the information to understand the phenomenon.

∙ Coronal heating; coronal mass ejection; pre-flare and flare activities and their characteristics;

∙ Dynamics of space weather; and propagation of particles and fields.

∙ It is equipped with seven payloads (instruments) on board with four of them carrying out remote sensing of the Sun and three of them carrying in-situ observation.

What are the seven payloads?

∙ The Visible Emission Line Coronagraph (VELC) will study the Corona, imaging and spectroscopy, and Coronal mass ejections.

∙ The Solar Ultraviolet Imaging Telescope (SUIT) will focus upon the Photosphere and Chromosphere imaging- narrow and broadband. It will also measure the solar irradiance variations.

∙ The Solar Low Energy X-ray Spectrometer (SoLEXS) and High Energy L1 Orbiting X-ray Spectrometer (HEL1OS) will study the soft and hard X-ray flares from the Sun over a wide X-ray energy range.

∙ The Aditya Solar wind Particle Experiment (ASPEX) and Plasma Analyser Package For Aditya (PAPA) will  analyze  the  electrons  and protons in the Solar wind or particles. It will also study the energetic ions.

∙ The Advanced Tri-axial High Resolution Digital Magnetometers will study the interplanetary magnetic field at L1 point.