ISRO's Aditya-L1 captures first high-energy X-ray glimpse of solar flares
PTC News Desk: ISRO's Aditya-L1 spacecraft's X-ray spectrometer, HEL1OS, captured the first high-energy X-ray glimpse of solar flares during its maiden solar mission.
ISRO reported on Tuesday that the spectrometer on board Aditya-L1 recorded the impulsive phase of solar flares during its first observation period, which began on October 29, 2023.
A solar flare is a sudden brightening of the solar atmosphere.
Flares increase emission in all wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum, including radio, optical, UV, soft X-rays, hard X-rays, and gamma-rays.
The HEL1OS X-ray spectrometer, commissioned on October 27, 2023, is currently undergoing threshold fine-tuning and calibration operations. Since then, it has been monitoring the Sun for hard X-ray activity.
"The instrument is set to monitor the sun's high-energy X-ray activity with fast timing and high-resolution spectra," ISRO said.
Researchers can use HEL1OS data to study explosive energy release and electron acceleration during the impulsive phases of solar flares.
HEL1OS was created by the Space Astronomy Group at ISRO's UR Rao Satellite Centre in Bengaluru.
The Aditya-L1 spacecraft, which is carrying out India's first solar mission, performed a trajectory correction manoeuvre (TCM) for about 16 seconds in early October.
ISRO then noted that the manoeuvre was required to correct the trajectory evaluated after tracking the Trans-Lagrangean Point 1 Insertion (TL1I) manoeuvre performed on September 19.
So far on its journey, the spacecraft has successfully completed a few earthbound manoeuvres as well as a Trans-Lagrangean Point 1 Insertion (TL1I) manoeuvre. The spacecraft successfully escaped Earth's influence in the process.
- ANI
