ISRO Aditya-L1 Sun Mission To Take Off In 2020

ISRO is already planning its next ambitious launch and this time, it's aiming for the Sun. The Aditya-L1 is the first Indian mission to study the Sun that will launch in 2020. At the moment, the future of ISRO's mission to the Moon faces an uncertain future. However, the Indian Space Research Organization is gearing up to explore the Sun.

ISRO Aditya-L1 Mission Equipment

The ISRO Aditya-1 project seems daring, but the space organization is prepping for the unique mission. The Aditya-1 was conceived as a 400kg class satellite carrying one payload, cites the ISRO's official statement. The project will have a Visible Emission Line Coronagraph (VELC) with a plan to launch in an 800 km low earth orbit.

The ISRO Aditya-L1 mission was earlier named as Aditya-1. The satellite will now be placed in a halo orbit around the Lagrangian point 1 (L1) of the Sun-Earth system, which has the advantages of viewing the Sun continuously without any occultation or eclipses, resulting in the name change. The Aditya-L1 will be placed in a halo orbit around the L1, which is 1.5 million km from the Earth. The satellite carries an additional six payloads with enhanced science scope and objectives, ISRO states.

ISRO Aditya-L1 Mission Purpose

The earlier proposed Aditya-1 was meant to observe only the solar corona, which are the Sun's outer layers extending to thousands of kilometers from the solar object. Aditya-1 was meant to study how the corona gets heated to its temperature of more than a million-degree Kevin.

Now with the proposed Aditya-L1, the mission plans to observe the Sun's Photosphere (soft and hard X-ray), Chromosphere (UV), and the corona (Visible and NIR). The additional experiment will also study the particle flux emanating from the Sun and reaching the L1 orbit. The variation of the magnetic field will also be measured with Aditya-L1's magnetometer payload.

What Happens To Chandrayaan-2?

ISRO is walking a tight rope to re-establish contact with Chandrayan-2 Vikram lander on the South pole of the Moon after it lost contact on September 7. But as the Sun sets on the lunar surface, time is running out for ISRO.

The nightfall on the Moon means a drastic drop in the temperature which the Vikram lander can't sustain. NASA's LRO has captured images of the lunar surface where Vikram was supposed to land, but they're still being processed and no further updates were released.