Photo: APL/NASA
Parker’s solar probe touches the sun for the first time
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The American robotic station for the first time passed through one of the layers of the Sun’s atmosphere – the corona.
The American spacecraft Parker Solar Probe “touched” the Sun for the first time.
About it reported on Tuesday, the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
The press service of the space agency clarified that the spacecraft flew through the upper layers of the Sun’s atmosphere, where the temperature can reach 500 thousand Kelvin (about 500 thousand degrees Celsius) and took samples of particles and magnetic fields from there.
“NASA’s Parker solar probe is now in the upper atmosphere of the Sun – its corona, having measured the particles and magnetic fields in it,” it said.
“The new milestone marks one major step for the Parker Solar Probe and one giant leap in solar science. Just as the moon landing allowed scientists to understand how it formed, touching the material that makes up the sun will help scientists uncover important information. about our nearest star and its effect on the solar system, “the agency added.
It is known that the probe was launched in August 2018 from the spaceport at Cape Canaveral (Florida). At the end of October of the same year, he broke the record for approaching the Sun set by the German-American Helios 2. The station, worth about $ 1.5 billion, houses four sets of scientific instruments. The equipment is protected by an 11.43 cm thick carbon fiber shell, which allows it to withstand heating up to 1.4 thousand degrees Celsius.
NASA expects the mission to make a fundamental contribution to understanding the causes of the “heating of the solar corona” and the emergence of the solar wind (a stream of ionized particles emanating from the solar corona).
We recall that it was previously reported that Ukraine plans to join the NASA program on sending people to the moon.
NASA will take part in the creation of a private space station
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