The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is all set for its first Solar Mission, Aditya L1 which is likely to take off on August 26, 2023. It is the first Indian space mission to study the sun.
The Aditya L1 aims at studying the atmosphere of the Sun as it releases huge amounts of energy into the Solar System that cause several disturbances in the space near the Earth.
Aditya L1 spacecraft is planned to be kept in a halo orbit around L1 or Lagrange point, which is about 1.5 million km away from Earth in the Earth-Sun system.
Keeping the orbit around L1 has the advantage of continuously viewing the sun without any eclipses. The spacecraft contains seven payloads to observe the different layers of the Sun.
The objective is to understand the initiation of Coronal Mass Ejection (CME), flares, and near-earth space weather. ISRO aims to understand the coupling and dynamics of the solar atmosphere.
The mission is unique as it is the first time spatially resolved solar disk in the near UV band. Spacecraft will use multi-direction observations for directional and energy anisotropy of solar wind.
It will take around four months after the launch for Aditya L1 to reach the desired Lagrange Point.