📰 Solar Orbiter closer to the Sun: stunning images

The ESA space probe has just passed very close to the Sun, an opportunity to take new images of our star and to ensure that the 10 onboard instruments are working perfectly well.

A curious solar « hedgehog »

Breathtaking images ! The probe (A space probe is an unmanned vessel sent by humans to explore more closely…) European Solar Orbit (Orbiter is a realistic space flight simulator, released as freeware (but not open…)launched in 2020, completed its first perihelion (The perihelion is the point of the orbit of a celestial body (planet, comet,…) closer, on 03/26/2022. It’s time for his journey around (Autour is the name that the avian nomenclature in the French language (update) gives…) of Sun (The Sun (Sol in Latin, Helios or Ήλιος in Greek) is the star…) where the probe passes very close to our star (A star is an autonomously light-emitting celestial object, similar to a…)only 0.32 AU (Astronomical Units), or about 48 million km, this time. There will be others during the mission.

As a result, the 10 onboard instruments recorded data (In information technology (IT), data is an elementary description, often…) unpublished: powerful flares, breathtaking views of the solar poles and a curious solar « hedgehog ». The objective of Solar Orbiter is to better understand the link between the Sun and theheliosphere (The heliosphere is an elongated bubble-shaped area in space, generated…)this zone in the form of an elongated bubble formed by the solar winds, plasma (In physics, plasma describes a state of matter made up of charged particles…) of charged particles continuously emitted by the Sun.

Make the connection between what the probe sees and what it « feels »

All (The whole understood as the whole of what exists is often interpreted as the world or…) the challenge for the scientists on the mission will be to cross-check data from remote sensing instruments (remote observation of theactivity (The term activity can refer to a profession.) of the Sun) and data from in situ instruments that analyze theenvironment (The environment is everything that surrounds us. It is all the natural elements and…) probe where the flow (The word flux (from the Latin fluxus, flow) generally designates a set of elements…) solar particles arrive: make the connection between what the probe sees and what the probe « feels ».

And just a few days (The day or the day is the interval which separates the sunrise from the sunset; it is the…) before this close passage, on 03/21 exactly, a cloud of energetic particles swept over the probe. the detector (A detector is a technical device (instrument, substance, matter) that changes…) (EPD for Energetic Particle Detector) recorded the event well, with the most energetic particles arriving first. RPW (for Radio and Plasma Waves), assembled at CNES, also captured a strong sweep characteristic of radio frequencies produced when accelerated particles, mostly electrons, moving in a spiral along the lines of the magnetic field (In physics, the magnetic field (or magnetic induction, or flux density…) solar. Among remote sensing instruments, the EUI (for Extreme Ultraviolet (Ultraviolet (UV) radiation is electromagnetic radiation with a length…) Imager), extreme ultraviolet imager and the spectrometer (A spectrometer is a measuring device for breaking down a quantity…) X-rays, STIX (for Spectrometer/Telescope for Imaging X-rays) both have 2 observed events on the Sun which could be at the origin of the emission of the particles but nothing is less certainscientists will have to analyze the data carefully before they can draw any conclusions.

A boon for « space weather »

Among the surprises of this 1st close flyby, on 03/26, the team of David Berghmans, from the Royal Observatory of Belgium, responsible scientific (A scientist is a person who is dedicated to the study of a science or sciences and who…) of the EUI discovered on the solar corona (The solar corona is the part of the Sun’s atmosphere located beyond the chromosphere…) a phenomenon provisionally nicknamed « hedgehog » since it extends over 25,000 km and presents a multitude of hot and cold gas peaks in all directions. « The images are truly breathtaking, says the scientist. Even if Solar Orbiter stopped collecting data tomorrow, I would be busy for years trying to figure it all out.« 

Desi raulin, solar orbiter project manager at cnes

This close perihelion of 03/26 is a real success for the Solar Orbiter mission: « the French scientists are very happy with the result because they were able to collect a lot of dataexplains Desi Raulin, Project Manager (A project manager, in IT, is the person responsible for controlling the smooth running of the…) Solar Orbiter, at CNES. All the instruments work perfectly despite a technical problem we had with the SWA (Solar Wind Analyser) instrument which impacted the observations at the beginning. It is a real relief that the space probe (A space probe is an unmanned spacecraft sent by man to…) has acquired so much data via its instruments and with such a high quality of resolution. At CNES, we will continue to support the French scientific community engaged in this mission, for the next 5 years, the duration of the phase (The word phase can have several meanings, it is used in several fields and…) senior scientist.« 

And then all these observations are a gold mine in the field of « space weather ». The idea being, in the long term, to have a reliable and precise system capable of predicting the solar phenomena likely to damage the electrical installations on Earth (Earth is the third planet in the Solar System in order of distance…) and even to threaten the astronauts by orbit (In celestial mechanics, an orbit is the trajectory drawn by a body in space…). For example, on 03/10, a coronal mass ejection passed through the Solar Orbiter probe. The MAG instrument (for Magnetemeter), a magnetometer (A magnetometer is a device used to measure the magnetization of a system. There are some…) embarked, allowed to predict that it was going to strike the Earth 18 time (Time is a unit of measurement:) later, the weather (Time is a concept developed by human beings to apprehend the…) to protect themselves.

Solar Obiter’s perihelions:
06/15/2020 (0.52 AU)
02/10/2021 (0.49 AU)
09/12/2021 (0.59 AU)
03/26/2022 (0.32 AU) – 1st close perihelion
10/13/2022 (0.29 AU)

Solar orbiter, a mission with a strong French contribution

Solar Orbiter is an international collaborative space mission between the European (ESA) and American (NASA) space agencies. France, through the CNES, 7 laboratories of the CNRS (The National Center for Scientific Research, better known by its acronym CNRS, is the largest…), universities and the CEA, took part in 6 of the 10 instruments fixed to the satellite. CNES has provided (The Foúrnoi Korséon (Greek: Φούρνοι…) the RPW instrument (in photo opposite), an analyzer ofwaves (A wave is the propagation of a disturbance producing a reversible variation in its path…) radio and plasma and ensured the mastery (The master’s degree is a university degree or diploma corresponding to the degree or title of…) other contributions, providing technical expertise to partners as needed. In the case of the PAS sensor, CNES ensured the activities ofengineering (Engineering refers to all the functions ranging from design and studies to …) thermal (Thermal is the science that deals with the production of energy, the use of…) and took in charge (The payload represents what is actually…) several component tests and materials (A material is a material of natural or artificial origin that man shapes to…)as well as analyzes relating to electrostatic discharges, expertise in electromagnetic compatibility (Electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) is the suitability of a device or a…) and magnetic tests.