Few people write about the Parker Solar Probe anymore.
Indeed, this spacecraft attracted some attention when it launched. After all, it’s the fastest moving object ever built by humans. The spacecraft will rely on the sun’s gravity to reach its maximum speed of 430,000 miles per hour, or more than one-sixth of 1% of the speed of light. At this speed, you can get from New York to Tokyo in less than a minute.
The Parker Solar Probe also has the distinction of being the first NASA spacecraft to be named after a living person. At the time of its release in August 2018, physicist Eugene Parker was 91 years old.
But six years since a spacecraft has been hurtling through space and flying close to the sun? Not that many. Let’s be honest: The astrophysical properties of the Sun and its complex structure are not something most people think about on a daily basis.
But this small spacecraft (weighing less than a ton and with a science payload of only about 110 pounds (50 kg)) is about to star. Quite literally. On Christmas Eve, the Parker Solar Probe will make its closest approach to the Sun ever. It will come within 3.8 million miles (6.1 million kilometers) of the Sun’s surface and enter the solar atmosphere for the first time.
Yes, it will be quite hot. Scientists estimate that the spacecraft’s heat shield can withstand temperatures in excess of 2,500 degrees Fahrenheit (1,371 degrees Celsius) on Christmas Eve, nearly the opposite temperature of the North Pole.
go directly to the source
To understand why the spacecraft is being subjected to such torture, I spoke to NASA’s chief scientist, Nikki Fox. Before moving to NASA Headquarters, Fox was a project scientist on the Parker Solar Probe, and she explained that scientists really want to understand the origins of the solar wind.
This is a stream of charged particles that emanates from the sun’s outermost layer, the corona. Scientists have been wondering about this particular mystery for more than half a century, Fox explained.
“Simply put, we want to find the birthplace of the solar wind,” she said.
Back in the 1950s, before there were satellites or spacecraft to measure the properties of the Sun, Parker predicted the existence of this solar wind. The scientific community was quite skeptical of this idea until 1962, when the Mariner 2 mission began measuring the solar wind. In fact, many people were mocking Parker.
As the scientific community began to accept Parker’s theory, it became interested in learning more about the solar wind, the fundamental building block of the entire solar system. Although the solar wind is invisible to the naked eye, when auroras are seen on Earth, it means that the solar wind is interacting particularly intensely with Earth’s magnetosphere.
(Tag translation) ars technica
