ISRO said, “The launch of Aditya-L1, India’s first space-based Indian observatory to study the Sun, is scheduled to take place on 2 September 2023 at 11:50 am Eastern Standard Time from Sriharikota,” as reported by ANI, a partner of TV BRICS.

Aditya-L1 will be India’s first space mission to study the Sun. The spacecraft will be placed on a halo-orbit around the Lagrangian point 1 (L1) of the Sun-Earth system, which is about 1.5 million kilometres away from our planet.

A satellite on a halo-orbit around the L1 point has the major advantage of observing the Sun continuously without any interference. This will give a greater advantage to observe solar activity and its effect on space weather in real time.

The spacecraft carries seven payloads to observe the photosphere, chromosphere and the outermost layers of the Sun (corona) using electromagnetic particle and magnetic field detectors.

ISRO also mentioned the objectives of the Aditya-L1 mission, “To study the dynamics of the Sun’s upper atmosphere (chromosphere and corona). Study of chromospheric and coronal heating, physics of partially ionised plasma, initiation of coronal mass ejections and flares. Observation of particles and plasma medium in-situ, providing data for studying the dynamics of the Sun’s particles and much more.”

Earlier, it was announced that India took a giant leap when the Chandrayaan-3 descent module successfully landed at the South Pole of the Moon. This made it the first country to accomplish the historic feat.

India became the fourth country after the US, China and Russia to successfully land on the surface of Moon.

India, as a BRICS country, has demonstrated that there is immense potential for scientific research and technological innovation growth in space in developing countries. Its ambitions and achievements in space exploration are an important contribution to the global scientific community as well as to technology and progress within BRICS and beyond.

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