Edited by Deepali Verma
Aditya L1, the Indian Space Research Organisation’s (ISRO) maiden solar mission, is prepared to take on its final manoeuvre to reach its destination and will be injected into its final orbit on the evening of January 6. Once its final destination is reached, the spacecraft will be able to view the sun without any eclipses.
Launched on September 2, 2023, the spacecraft has covered four earth-bound manoeuvres and a Trans-Lagrangian Point 1 Insertion (TL1I) manoeuvres, all being successful.
ISRO chief S Somanath told news agency ANI on January 1, “Aditya-L1will reach its L1 point on January 6 at 4pm and we are going to initiate the final manoeuvre to keep it there.”
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Post a flight duration of 63 minutes and 20 seconds on January 6, the Aditya-L1 spacecraft would get a successful injection into an elliptical orbit that measures 235×19500 km around the Earth.
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Aditya-L1 is the inaugural Bharatiya space-based observatory designed to examine the Sun from a halo orbit positioned around the first Sun-Earth Lagrangian point (L1) that is situated approximately 1.5 million km away from Earth. The director of the Indian Institute of Astrophysics in Bengaluru told The Indian Express, “Aditya L1 will reach the halo orbit around the L1 point. As the Earth revolves around the Sun, the L1 point will also move and so does the halo orbit.”
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An ISRO official further told The Indian Express that “Aditya L1 has already reached the L1 point and the manoeuvre planned on January 6 will put it in desired orbit. If not placed into an orbit, the spacecraft will continue to travel towards the Sun”.
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The Lagrange Point is defined as a unique region where the gravitational forces between the Earth and the Sun reach equilibrium. While absolute neutralisation is not achievable owing to the influence of other celestial bodies such as the Moon, Mars, and Venus, the L1 point provides a rather stable position for observational purposes.
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Aditya-L1 comes equipped with seven scientific payloads that are all developed indigenously by ISRO and national research laboratories. These payloads are designed to specially observe the photosphere, chromosphere and the outermost layers of the Sun (the corona) by making use of electromagnetic particle and magnetic field detectors.
