Aditya-L1 Mission Offers New Insights Into the Direction of Solar Eruptions, Pg12

Key Highlights:

• Aditya-L1, India's first solar mission, has generated Doppler velocity images of the solar corona using its Visible Emission Line Coronagraph (VELC) payload.
• These images provide new insights into the propagation direction of Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs) along the Sun-Earth line.
• Scientists at the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA) developed the software for processing the VELC data.
• VELC is currently unique in its capability to generate such spectroscopic images in the visible wavelength range.

Aditya L1.jpg

Detailed Insights:

• The Aditya-L1 mission was launched by ISRO on September 2, 2023, and is positioned in a halo orbit around the Sun-Earth Lagrange Point-1 (L1).
• CMEs are massive plasma clouds ejected from the Sun that can significantly disrupt near-Earth space, affecting satellites and communication systems.
• Understanding the propagation direction of CMEs is crucial for accurate space weather forecasting and mitigating their impact on Earth's technological infrastructure.
• The Doppler effect, commonly observed in sound waves, is applied to light waves to determine if solar plasma is moving towards or away from the observer.
• The processed images from VELC will be disseminated to the scientific community for further research and analysis.

Scientific/Technical Concepts Involved:

• Aditya-L1: India's first dedicated space-based observatory to study the Sun and its atmosphere.
• Visible Emission Line Coronagraph (VELC): The primary instrument on Aditya-L1 designed to image and spectrographically observe the solar corona.
• Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs): Large expulsions of plasma and magnetic field from the Sun's corona into space.
• Doppler Effect: The change in frequency or wavelength of a wave due to the relative motion between the source and the observer.