Solar probe Parker , approaching the Sun, in the view of the artist. Parker, which will be launched in 2018, will provide us with new data on solar activity and will make an important contribution to our ability to predict the main events of the space weather world that affect life on Earth.It took 60 years, but scientists with engineers are finally ready to reach the stars - that is, our star. And they are sure that they will not burn.
This summer, NASA will launch the Parker solar probe, an impressively heat-resistant spacecraft designed for the closest approach to the surface of the Sun, from which all ships dared before. He will fly at a distance of 6 million kilometers from the burning surface, more than seven times closer than the previous ship. If everything goes according to plan, then during close flights the ship will spin at a speed of 724,205 km / h, and carry on itself a unique heat shield directed exactly to the surface. After seven years he will make 24 revolutions around the Sun and pass by Venus seven times.
During this time, Parker will collect a whole galaxy of data that will help answer the hottest questions of scientists - as well as solve burning puzzles - associated with a hot plasma ball that illuminates our solar system. Namely, he will try to help us finally understand why the atmosphere of the Sun is 300 times hotter than a surface that has a pleasant temperature of 5727 ° C. This fact refutes the basic physics, and is not explained to this day. One of the leading hypotheses of temperature change belongs to the famous physicist [and the astronomer]
Eugene Parker , after whom the probe is named. In the mid-1950s, Parker suggested that the overheated solar corona could be explained by a complex system of plasma, magnetic fields, and energy particles that produce solar explosions, called "
flashlight ."
Scientists are eager for data that can be obtained by moving closer to these potentially occurring explosions, as well as to a cascade of energy called the "
solar wind ." With this data, they will be able to test their hypotheses. And besides understanding the temperature of the corona, data on these solar phenomena can help clarify poorly understood space weather that can cause damage to satellites and power lines on Earth.
In general, Parker's solar probe is “the coolest and hottest mission under the Sun,” Nicky Fox told reporters at a press showing of a spacecraft at the Goddard Space Flight Center. Fox is a solar probe project leader at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory. She presented the mission as “the first meeting of humanity with a star”, which is “extremely historical”.
The first idea to reach the Sun with the help of a spacecraft was born around 1958, even before NASA began working, she noted. But it took six decades for the technology to catch up with the dreams of scientists. Parker's solar probe is a realization of these ideas, armed with the mother of all thermal shields.
Taking the fire over
The surface of the spacecraft will survive the brutal temperatures with a carbon composite shield 11.4 cm thick, covered with white ceramics. The outer white layer will allow the probe to reflect as much radiation as possible. On close approaches, the outer layer will face temperatures of about 1,400 ° C. But what is under it will maintain a much lower temperature at 315-371 ° C, according to lead engineer Betsy Kongdon.
The shield is located on a huge radiator built on a titanium frame. The structure will hold the payload of the spacecraft in a cool dark shadow during the ship’s passes past the Sun. In fact, the scientists and engineers who created the ship were more concerned that their scientific instruments and equipment would not freeze, and not because they could melt during the mission. In order to avoid this, the instruments are wrapped in thermal insulation and connected to solar-powered heaters. This will keep the tools at a pleasant temperature of 28 ° C.
Star energy
The solar panels that power these tools — as well as other electronics on board — are located on the flaps that extend out from under the radiator. These arrays are specially designed so that, being exposed to intense radiation, to withstand heat with a special cooling system. The system includes a 4-liter water tank and a pump located inside the ship, which will pump cold water through the arrays, keeping them at operating temperature.
Also inside the ship are many communication devices and a small fuel tank that feeds the shunting engines. They will independently produce short impulses so as to keep the probe shield directed exactly towards the Sun all the time. If the probe deviates by only one degree from the course, a portion of the temperature-sensitive payload may be exposed to solar radiation, due to which the ship will melt and collapse. But Fox assured us that the ship had a lot of safety systems that could prevent it.
Star data
As long as the ship is busy not to melt and freeze, a set of scientific instruments will collect long-awaited solar data. According to Adam Szabo, the chief of the NASA Heliosphere Physics Laboratory, these data will be of four types. The first is local measurements of the solar wind, so there is a set of instruments that measure particles, including protons, electrons, droplets of ionized helium, and traces of heavier elements. “Tools measure their speed, temperature and quantity,” he told us.
The second set of tools measures magnetic and electric fields, which can "radically complicate" the behavior of flying around ions. The third set tries to catch the particles of the highest energies. And, finally, there is a set of cameras that will photograph the plasma coming from the corona from close range.
Star dates
These tools and the rest of the ship are now undergoing final checks. At the end of March, scientists and engineers from the Goddard Center carried out the last checks of the equipment inside the satellite before closing it completely. Then the satellite was sent to the Kennedy Space Center in Florida for further checks.
So far, the launch date for the probe is July 31, 2018. According to this schedule, it will fly past Venus in late September, and will reach the crown in early November. Scientists expect data to begin in March 2019, according to astrophysicist Nicky Viall.
With this data, “I think we can answer a lot of questions and get a whole mountain of new questions that we haven’t even been able to come up with,” said Viall.
It is assumed that the ship will make 24 revolutions around the Sun in six years and 11 months, but Fox told us that the crew expects the ship to work for a couple more years after that. When he eventually runs out of fuel, Parker's solar probe will remain in a stable orbit, but will begin to lean, substituting sensitive equipment for the burning heat. After that, it will fall apart into smaller pieces and become part of a cloud of dust.