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In the early hours of last Thursday (12/09), the American Space Agency – NASA launched another mission called Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE). It has a satellite equipped with powerful telescopes capable of measuring through X-rays in black holes. The telescope’s job is to measure the x-rays emitted from the respective black holes and neutron stars.
The launch took place at 3:00 am, Brasília time, directly from the Kennedy Space Center, located in the state of Florida, aboard a SpaceX rocket. NASA explained the initiative is an effort between it and the Italian Space Agency, which makes three telescopes with this technology that seeks to observe cosmic rays.
In fact, the spacecraft is even smaller than NASA’s Chandra X-ray observatory, but it is equally the first observatory dedicated to this type of project. The mission was carried out from the program Launch Services Program (LSP), developed in 1998. The program has the flexibility of choice by the provider of the platform to be launched. In this case, 39A was chosen.
The platform’s differential is that it has a water suppression system that helps to mitigate the effects of the rocket from launch. With that, the system allows greater security for the satellite until it reaches orbit. About 33 minutes after launch, the satellite and rocket dismemberment.
In about a minute, the platform was already activating its solar panels. According to data from NASA, the satellite orbits the Earth’s equator at an altitude of 600km, sending the first telemetry data. The collection will be done around the most extreme objects in the universe, such as supernova remnants and particle fluxes ejected from black holes.
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