Solar Orbiter: Rich in situ data collection

News

4 June 2021

Launched a little over a year ago (February 10, 2020), the Solar Orbiter probe continues its journey towards the Sun, carrying on board a dozen instruments! It is currently at a distance of 0.95 AU (astronomical unit corresponding to the average distance between the Earth and the Sun, i.e. 150 million kilometers).

The Solar Orbiter probe facing the Sun. Copyright ESA/ATG medialab

One of the main objectives of the Solar Orbiter mission is to better understand the mechanisms of the solar wind (heating, acceleration, evolution, composition) and its relationship with eruptive phenomena at the surface of the Sun (e.g. coronal mass ejections). For these purposes, it carries on board remote sensing instruments and instruments measuring the characteristics of the solar wind plasma around the probe (the in situ measurements). The RPW and SWA instruments belong to the latter category. Some of their subsystems have been developed by CNES, as well as four French laboratories of CNRS (LESIA, LPP, LPC2E, IRAP).

As soon as one week after the launch of the probe, these two instruments started to operate and provide data to scientists!

IRAP Contact

  • Philippe Louarn, philippe.louarn@irap.omp.eu

More news

Juno identifies the missing auroral footprint of the moon Callisto at Jupiter’s poles

Since July 2016, the Juno mission orbiting Jupiter has been studying the properties and physical mechanisms of auroral imprints. A study recently published in the journal Nature Communications shows that […]

Deep long-period earthquakes discovered beneath Massif Central volcanoes

A recent study published in Geophysical Research Letters reveals atypical seismic signals beneath the volcanoes of the Massif Central. These signals, combined with the active presence of magma at depth, […]

Ganymede and Callisto: frozen destinies with divergent origins

Two icy moons of Jupiter, although similar in size and proximity, have radically different internal structures. A new study suggests that this dichotomy has its origins in their formation, challenging […]

Search