A detection closest to the sun, how to use Venus and what records to break?
NASA solar spacecraft whizzed past the 9th solar exploration flight
artist's depiction of Parker solar probe while studying the sun. (Image source: Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory)
NASA's Japanese-sweeping spacecraft is conducting its ninth bold subduction of our nearby stars (i.e., the Sun) to continue exploring the secrets of the Sun's functioning.
The latest detection flight of Parker Solar Probe was closest to the sun, when the spacecraft was about 6.5 million miles (10.4 million kilometers) from the surface of the sun. At that time, the detector was traveling at about 330,000 mph (532,000 km/h). It is working to understand the mechanism by which the solar atmosphere becomes so hot—thousands of degrees above the surface of the sun—and the origin of the solar wind (a stream of charged particles that keep pouring into the solar system).
As the spacecraft flies closer and closer to the sun, it is easier for us to solve these mysteries. "We are entering a critical phase of the Parker mission, and we are focusing on a lot of things in this experience," Nour E. Raouafi, a Parker solar probe project scientist at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, said in a statement from NASA.
Added Lauvafi: "We expect the spacecraft to pass through the accelerated zone of the continuous flow of charged particles that make up the solar wind. Solar activity is also accelerating, which makes it promising to study larger solar wind structures (such as coronal mass ejection) and the associated high-energy particle ."
In the detection flight, the spacecraft meets its existing records - which is also the overall record of humans - i.e., records closest to the sun and records of the fastest moving objects in the spacecraft. However, Parker Solar Probe will soon continue to break both records in a series.
The spacecraft of this mission will fly over Venus for the fifth time, use Venus' gravity to adjust its orbit in space, and quietly approach the sun. The spacecraft is expected to fly over Venus twice after this year's mobilization and before the currently planned mission ends in 2025. By then, the spacecraft will be only 3.8 million miles (6.1 million kilometers) from the surface of the sun.
Although the research team behind Parker's solar probe has expectations for today's observations, it is still possible that scientists may accidentally discover another surprise about the sun.
"You never know what else you will find when you explore so close to the sun," said Lauvafy. "It's always exciting."
related knowledge
Parker Solar Probe is also translated as Parker Solar Probe, referred to as Parker or Parker, formerly known as Sun Probe or Sun Probe+. It is an unmanned spacecraft launched by NASA in 2018. Its mission is to repeatedly detect and observe the sun's external corona. It will be closest to the sun in 2025, with a distance of only 9.86 solar radius from the center of the sun, with a speed of up to 690,000 km/h, or 0.064% of the speed of light.
This project was announced in the fiscal year 2009 and the cost of the project was US$1.5 billion. The spacecraft designed and manufactured by the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory [13] was launched on August 12, 2018 [2]. It is named after the physicist Eugene Parker, an emeritus professor at the University of Chicago, in recognition of his contribution to solar physics; this is the first time that NASA has taken the name of a living figure as the official name of a mission [14].
The sun is a star in the center of the solar system. It is almost an ideal sphere intertwined by thermal plasma and magnetic field. Its diameter is about 1,392,000 kilometers, equivalent to 109.3 times the diameter of of the earth ; its mass is about 2×10³⁰kg, accounting for about 99.86% of the total mass of the solar system. From the chemical composition, about three-quarters of the mass of sun is hydrogen, and almost all the rest are helium, including oxygen, carbon, neon, iron and other heavy elements with less than 2% mass.
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’s stellar spectrum is classified as G-type main sequence star (G2V).Although it is white by the naked eye, because the yellow-green part of the visible spectrum is the strongest, when viewed from the surface of the earth, the scattering of the atmosphere makes the sky blue, so it appears yellow, and is informally classified as " yellow dwarf " [17] [18]. G2 in the spectral classification mark indicates that its surface temperature is about 5778K (5505°C), and V indicates that the sun, like most other stars, is an main sequence star, . Its energy comes from the nuclear fusion reaction of hydrogen giant into helium, and its core can fusion 620 million tons of hydrogen per second.
BY: Meghan Bartels
FY: Tessa
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