Solar Probe Plus – Delta IV H/Star-48BV – Canaveral SLC-37B – 12.08.2018 в 07:31 UTC

[tnt22]

John Gadarowski‏ @ULAJohnG 10 ч. назад

Bonus pic to bring this full circle. Launch Mate Unit returning to HIF for reload #DeltaIV

[tnt22]

Tory Bruno‏Подлинная учетная запись @torybruno 43 мин. назад

Here's #PSP post flight. Another bullseye

[tnt22]

NASA's Parker Solar Probe launch photographer behind-the-scenes - Dedicated to Eugene Parker

LearnTimeLapse

Опубликовано: 16 авг. 2018 г.

Liftoff of United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy... Parker Solar Probe is headed for our nearest star! Launch photographer BTS by Ryan Chylinski

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhK0lKj2S3Ahttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhK0lKj2S3A (6:18)

[tnt22]

Jonathan McDowell‏Подлинная учетная запись @planet4589 21 ч. назад

At 0h UTC on Aug 19, @ParkerSunProbe is 7.1 million km from Earth and has fallen 750,000 km towards the Sun and picked up speed by 261 m/s (940 km/hr)

[tnt22]

https://spaceflightnow.com/2018/08/19/first-mission-milestones-accomplished-on-nasas-newly-launched-parker-solar-probe/

First milestones accomplished on NASA's newly-launched Parker Solar Probe
August 19, 2018 | Stephen Clark


Artist's concept of NASA's Parker Solar Probe departing Earth. Credit: NASA

Space missions dispatched into the solar system often have journeys lasting years before reaching a scientific payoff, but NASA's Parker Solar Probe launched last weekend on a speedy departure fr om planet Earth is already getting ready to sweep closer to the sun than any spacecraft in history during a flyby later this year.

The armored spacecraft lifted off Sunday, Aug. 12, from Cape Canaveral on top of a United Launch Alliance Delta 4-Heavy rocket, one of the most powerful launchers in the world.

Sometimes used to launch satellites as big as a school bus, the Delta 4-Heavy and a kick motor shot Parker Solar Probe — the size of a small car — into space with enough speed to reach Venus in just 52 days, the fastest-ever journey to from Earth to another planet.

Parker Solar Probe will slingshot past Venus, with the craft's closest approach expected Oct. 3 at 4:44 a.m. EDT (0844 GMT) to redirect its orbit closer to the sun. The gravity assist flyby will set up the solar probe for its first perihelion — or close approach to the sun — on Nov. 5 at 10:27 p.m. EST (0327 GMT on Nov. 6).

Those dates changed slightly after launch delays pushed back Parker Solar Probe's liftoff from an original target date of July 31.

In November, the spacecraft will reach a point in its elliptical, oval-shaped orbit roughly 15 million miles (24.1 million kilometers) from the sun's surface, breaking a record set by the U.S.-German Helios 2 mission, which passed as close as 27 million miles (43.4 million kilometers) from the sun in April 1976.

Спойлер

Parker Solar Probe carries four instrument packages to measure magnetic and electric fields, detect, count and characterize particles in the solar wind and inside the sun's atmosphere, and take white light images inside the sun's corona.


A Delta 4-Heavy rocket boosted NASA's Parker Solar Probe toward the sun during an early morning launch Sunday from Cape Canaveral. Credit: United Launch Alliance

The $1.5 billion mission has been on NASA's to-do list for six decades, since the agency's formation and the first prediction of the solar wind by Eugene Parker, a University of Chicago physicist whose hypotheses about the supersonic stream of particles emanating from the sun were later confirmed by early space missions.

NASA named the solar probe for Parker last year, the first time the agency has named a science mission for a living person. Parker, 91, traveled to the Kennedy Space Center for the Aug. 12 launch.

The 1,424-pound (646-kilogram) spacecraft separated from a kick stage that launched atop the Delta 4-Heavy less than 45 minutes after liftoff last Sunday. A few minutes later, ground controllers confirmed the probe extended its two solar panels to begin generating electricity.

Parker Solar Probe's high-gain antenna, designed to downlink science data to Earth, was released from its launch locks Aug. 13. The mission's autonomous control system, which uses fast-spinning reaction wheels and thrusters, has also been activated as planned, according to an update released Friday by NASA and the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland, which built the spacecraft.

The spacecraft also powered up the first of four instrument suites beginning Aug. 13. The spacecraft released clamps holding four of five antennas comprising the FIELDS instrument. The roughly 6-foot-long (2-meter) antennas will be deployed around 30 days after launch to stick out from behind the probe's heat shield, exposing the sensors to the harsh environment of the corona for measurements of electric and magnetic fields, plasma waves, and interplanetary radio emissions.

Parker Solar Probe also extended its magnetometer boom, which holds three magnetometers and a smaller, fifth antenna that is part of the FIELDS instrument suite.

"Parker Solar Probe is operating as designed, and we are progressing through our commissioning activities," Andy Driesman, the mission's project manager at APL. "The team – which is monitoring the spacecraft 24 hours a day, seven days a week – is observing nominal data from the systems as we bring them online and prepare Parker Solar Probe for its upcoming initial Venus gravity assist."


This diagram illustrates the instruments flying aboard NASA's Parker Solar Probe. Credit: NASA/JHUAPL

Scientists will have to wait more than six years for Parker Solar Probe's closest encounter with the sun, but the mission could produce results well before then.

"In our very first flyby of the corona (in November), we get to a little more than 15 million miles from the sun's surface," said Nicola Fox, Parker Solar Probe's project scientist at APL. "We're already in a ... very, very interesting coronal area. In fact, one of the key things about our early orbits is we're actually just sort of at this sweet spot.

"As we're rotating around the sun, the sun is rotating at the same time, the same speed," Fox said. "If you think about it in that frame, the spacecraft is staying over the same area of the sun for many, many days, allowing us to do some incredible science on our very first flyby."

The first perihelion in November will also return data to help scientists fully calibrate the spacecraft's science instruments.

Six more Venus flybys will spiral Parker Solar Probe ever-closer to the sun, redirecting the craft's trajectory toward its closest encounter with the sun at a range of 3.83 million miles (6.16 million kilometers) in 2024, roughly 4 percent the distance of the sun from Earth.

At that distance, the sun's gravity will whip Parker Solar Probe around in its orbit at a velocity of up to 430,000 mph (nearly 700,000 kilometers per hour), fast enough to travel from Philadelphia to Washington, D.C., in one second.

Reaching such immense speeds requires — perhaps counterintuitively — that Parker Solar Probe to first slow down, allowing solar gravity to pull it closer to the sun.

"Venus is very important to us," Fox said. "We actually use Venus to do gravity assists. Not like other missions you've heard about that take energy from the planet to speed up, we actually generously give energy to Venus, and we use Venus to slow us down just a little bit, really to focus our orbit, almost like doing a little handbrake turn and focusing us in towards the sun. We will do 24 petal orbits, coming very close to the sun on one side, going out around the orbit of Venus on the other."

Parker Solar Probe will fly through the corona, a super-heated envelope of plasma surrounding the sun wh ere temperatures soar to millions of degrees. The temperature at the surface of the sun is hundreds of times cooler, but still a scorching 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit (6,000 degrees Celsius).


An illustration of Parker Solar Probe's trajectory through the inner solar system following launch. Credit: NASA/JHUAPL

The corona is also thought by scientists to be the origin of the solar wind, a flow of charged particles flowing away from the sun in every direction, influencing the entire solar system and driving space weather.

"How is the solar wind accelerated up to millions of miles per hour very quickly in the solar corona? The work that Dr. Parker has laid out is the foundational work for understanding this process, and this is one of the primary goals of the Parker Solar Probe," said Alex Young, associate director for science in the heliophysics division at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland.

"Why does this all matter? We're living in this dynamic sun's atmosphere. We're living in the solar wind streaming by the Earth, streaming by other planets," Young said. "We see the beautiful results with the aurora, but this also creates an incredibly dynamic environment that impacts our technology, makes the environment hostile for astronauts, and in the most extreme cases, can even impact technology and power grids here on Earth."

A heat shield made of two carbon-carbon panels sandwiching a carbon foam core will protect most of the spacecraft from the blistering conditions in the corona. The heat shield's sun-facing side also has a sprayed-on white coating to reflect as much of the sun's heat as possible.

"We will be orbiting through the 3-million-degree plasma region," Fox said. "That sounds really hot, but the plasma there is not very dense. If you imagine turning your oven on to 400 degrees and letting it heat up, you could put your hand inside that oven. It won't burn you unless you touch something, so there's a difference between temperature and heat.

"There aren't that many particles around, so the actual amount that couples into the front side of our heat shield means that the front side is about 2,500 degrees Fahrenheit, or 1,400 degrees Centigrade (Celsius)," Fox said.

Behind the heat shield, or thermal protection system, the main body of the spacecraft will be warmed a little hotter than room temperature, but still within engineering tolerances for crucial parts like the probe's computer and propulsion system.

But some parts of the spacecraft, such as its science instrumentation and solar panels, will be exposed to the hot corona.

"We are very happy that we are well protected," Fox said. "We have a full suite of instruments to make the measurements that are so key and important for us to be able to close the science. So we have instruments that measure all of the magnetic and electric fields, they're looking for plasma waves, the very high-energy particles, and we also have a while light imager that is taking pictures of basically what we're about to plow through. So we have a full suite of instruments."


Artist's concept of NASA's Parker Solar Probe. Credit: NASA/JHUAPL/Steve Gribben

Engineers designed a cooling system using five liters of water to keep the craft's sensitive solar cells from overheating.

"Solar cells need to stay cool," Fox said. "They don't like to overheat and if they do, they don't work. So we (had) to find a way to cool our panels as we are making these cuts through the corona."

When Parker Solar Probe is closest to the sun, its on-board computer will automatically adjust its pointing, the performance of the cooling system, and other factors to keep the spacecraft safe. Ground controllers will not be able to uplink commands in real-time as the spacecraft transits through the corona.

"She is the most independent spacecraft, she's highly, highly autonomous," Fox said. "She has to look after herself when she's in this coronal region. There is no person in the loop, she is fully capable of figuring out if there's an anomaly how to rectify it. It takes light eight minutes to get from the sun to the Earth, we don't have time for her to send a signal so we can think about it and send it back. She has to be able to look after herself."

Parker Solar Probe will radio a beacon signal back to Earth as it flies through the corona, but ground commands and high-speed data downlinks will have to wait for times when the spacecraft is farther from the sun.

"These are kind of the big technology leaps we've had to make," Fox said. "That is why we've had to wait 60 years for this mission."

[свернуть]

[tnt22]

https://blogs.nasa.gov/parkersolarprobe/2018/08/21/after-near-perfect-trajectory-maneuver-parker-solar-probe-on-course-to-touch-the-sun/

After Near-Perfect Trajectory Maneuver, Parker Solar Probe On Course To Touch The Sun

Sarah Frazier
Posted Aug 21, 2018 at 10:00 am

At 6:07 a.m. EDT on Aug. 20, 2018, NASA's Parker Solar Probe successfully completed its first trajectory correction maneuver (known as TCM-1), achieving a near-perfect firing of its propulsion system and putting the spacecraft on course to "touch" the Sun. This maneuver sets up the orbital geometry that will allow Parker Solar Probe to come within about 3.83 million miles (8.86 solar radii) of the Sun's surface on its closest approach in 2024.

Following launch at 3:31 a.m. EDT on Aug. 12, the spacecraft control team at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, or APL, in Laurel, Maryland, analyzed Parker Solar Probe's position and quickly developed a re-optimized trajectory to place it in the best path for the seven Venus gravity assist maneuvers and 24 solar orbits that the mission will make. Re-assessing a spacecraft's trajectory after launch is a normal step, as the mission team is then able to accurately track the spacecraft's actual speed, direction and position to create a more precise trajectory plan.


The United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy rocket launches NASA's Parker Solar Probe to touch the Sun, Sunday, Aug. 12, 2018 from Launch Complex 37 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida. Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls

Spacecraft controllers at the mission operation center initiated the two-part TCM-1 beginning at 6:00 a.m. EDT on Aug. 19 with a 44-second burn of the engines. The majority of the engine firing, which lasted just over seven minutes, began at 6:00 a.m. EDT on Aug. 20.

"TCM-1 is one of the critical events of the mission and a major mission milestone," said Parker Solar Probe mission design and navigation manager Yanping Guo, from APL. "In the future, we only need to fine-tune the trajectory periodically, and no major adjustments or large maneuvers will be required unless something unusual happens. In short: We are on our way to touch the Sun!"

"The team completely nailed this maneuver," said APL's Andy Driesman, Parker Solar Probe project manager. "Execution of the burn was exceptional, measuring at less than 0.2 percent magnitude error—which translates to a 0.3 standard deviation, or sigma, from optimal. We had defined success for TCM-1 as up to 3 sigma, which really illustrates how phenomenally this was executed."

As of 12:00 p.m. EDT on August 20, Parker Solar Probe was 5.5 million miles from Earth, travelling at 39,500 miles per hour.

By Geoff Brown

Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab

[tnt22]

Jonathan McDowell‏Подлинная учетная запись @planet4589 3 мин. назад

As of 0400 UTC Aug 25, @ParkerSunProbe is 13.6 million km from Earth. Since reaching solar orbit it has fallen 2.6 million km towards the Sun and picked up speed by 3200 km/hr

[tnt22]

https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/jpl-roles-in-nasa-s-sun-bound-parker-solar-probe

Aug. 27, 2018

JPL Roles in NASA's Sun-Bound Parker Solar Probe

The navigation for NASA's Parker Solar Probe is led by the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, which also has a role in two of the spacecraft's four onboard instrument suites. Parker Solar Probe will fly closer to the Sun than any previous spacecraft and through the solar corona itself.

Спойлер

One instrument, called the Energetic Particle Instrument-Hi (EPI-Hi), will investigate the mysteries of high-speed solar particles that hurtle toward Earth at close to the speed of light. Observations by the Parker Solar Probe will lead to better predictions of space weather and address fundamental mysteries about the Sun's dynamic corona. EPI-Hi is part of the Integrated Science Investigation of the Sun, led by Principal Investigator David McComas of Princeton University in New Jersey.

"We will be exploring a region of space that has never before been visited," said Mark Wiedenbeck, the lead investigator on the EPI-Hi instrument and a principal research scientist at JPL. "We have ideas about what will be found, but the most important results may well come fr om observations that are completely unexpected."

Of particular interest to the EPI-Hi team is the unsolved riddle of how a small fraction of the charged particles from the Sun reach near-light speeds. These particles, protons, electrons and heavy ions can reach Earth in less than an hour, creating space weather hazards to humans and hardware in space. Until now, scientists had been observing from a distance the effects of what is happening near the Sun. With the Parker Solar Probe now on its way to fly through the region wh ere it is happening, scientists are confident they will obtain new clues and insight into the process.

The EPI-Hi instrument consists of stacks of silicon detectors designed to snag high-speed particles and measure their energies. Some of the detectors are very thin, with the thinnest being about one-eighth the thickness of a standard sheet of paper. For the detectors to make the required measurements, the thickness of these detectors could vary by no more than one-hundredth the thickness of a sheet of paper.

Another instrument on Parker Solar Probe -- the Wide-Field Imager for Solar Probe Plus (WISPR) – is the only camera aboard the spacecraft. It will take images of the Sun's corona and inner heliosphere. The imager has two telescopes that will capture images of the solar wind, shock waves and other coronal structures as they approach and pass the spacecraft. WISPR provides a very wide field-of-view, extending from 13 degrees away from the center of the Sun to 108 degrees away.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=8ZEwvQL486o
(video 0:20)
This animation shows Parker Solar Probe flying through the solar corona and coronal mass ejections. The fields of view of the two WISPR telescopes are defined by the pyramid-shaped rays coming from WISPR instrument. When approaching the Sun, the spacecraft flies such that its heat shield is always facing the Sun to protect the instruments and spacecraft from the intense solar radiation. As it gets closer to the Sun, the solar panels are folded back behind the shield so that only the tips are exposed to sunlight. The animation also shows how WISPR uses the heat shield to block out the direct sunlight so it can view the corona, which is seen in reflected sunlight.

"If you saw the solar eclipse last August, you saw the Sun's corona. That is our destination. WISPR will be taking images of the corona as it flies through it. The images will help us understand the morphology, velocity, acceleration and density of evolving solar wind structures when they are close to the Sun," said JPL scientist Paulett Liewer, a member of the WISPR Science Team. The WISPR principal pnvestigator is Russell Howard of the Naval Research Laboratory.

In leading Parker's navigation efforts, JPL is helping to implement the mission's innovative trajectory, developed by the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, Maryland, which built and operates the spacecraft for NASA. The Parker Solar Probe will use seven Venus flybys over nearly seven years to gradually shrink its orbit around the Sun, coming as close as 3.83 million miles (6.16 million kilometers) to the Sun, well within the orbit of Mercury and about seven times closer to the Sun than any spacecraft before.

In addition, the Parker Solar Probe Observatory Scientist, Principal Investigator Marco Velli, a UCLA professor, holds a part-time appointment as Heliophysics Liaison to NASA at JPL.

The Parker Solar Probe lifted off on Aug. 12, 2018, on a United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy rocket from Space Launch Complex-37 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. The mission's findings will help researchers improve their forecasts of space weather events, which have the potential to damage satellites and harm astronauts on orbit, disrupt radio communications and, at their most severe, overwhelm power grids.

EPI-Hi is managed for NASA by Caltech in collaboration with JPL, which is a division of Caltech. The Parker Solar Probe is part of NASA's Living with a Star Program, or LWS, to explore aspects of the Sun-Earth system that directly affect life and society. LWS is managed by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, for the Heliophysics Division of NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. Johns Hopkins APL manages the Parker Solar Probe mission for NASA.

[свернуть]

Last Updated: Aug. 27, 2018
Editor: Tony Greicius

[ОАЯ]

Кто-нибудь, подскажите как экран в 1/8 толщины листа бумаги мог выдержать перегрузку в полете? Наверное, были твердые подложки, которые отошли в сторону перед работой на орбите Солнца?

[PIN]

Нет там подложек. Диаметр датчиков от 1 и 3 см и они сами прекрасно выживают. Перегрузка здесь ни при чем, а вибро-акустистическая нагрузка - еще как
Из статьи разработчиков прибора (https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11214-014-0059-1)

We have subjected prototypes of the thin silicon detectors, L0 and L1, to selected environmental
tests since these detectors are not only a new technology development but will also
experience some particularly harsh conditions. We constructed a mechanical model of the
L0 detector having a thin silicon membrane of the same diameter but only 80 % of the L0
thickness, and subjected it to a severe acoustic test that went up to an overall sound pressure
level of 143 dB. The model came through this test undamaged.

143 это с зазором на 5-10 dB даже без учета того, что есть потери из-за расположения внутри аппарата.

[tnt22]

NASA | Countdown to T-Zero for a Journey to "Touch" the Sun

NASA

Опубликовано: 29 авг. 2018 г.

NASA's historic Parker Solar Probe mission that launched Aug. 12, 2018 from Space Launch Complex 37 on Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida will revolutionize our understanding of the Sun. The Parker Solar Probe spacecraft will travel through the Sun's atmosphere, closer to the surface than any spacecraft before it, facing brutal heat and radiation conditions — and ultimately providing humanity with the closest-ever observations of a star. This is a look at the moments leading up to T-Zero for NASA's mission to "touch" the Sun.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvgrXBoQY_Mhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvgrXBoQY_M (14:41)

[tnt22]

https://blogs.nasa.gov/parkersolarprobe/2018/09/05/parker-solar-probe-continues-successful-commissioning-operations/

Parker Solar Probe Continues Successful Commissioning Operations

Sarah Frazier
Posted Sep 5, 2018 at 10:31 am

Parker Solar Probe continues to bring its instruments and secondary systems online — slightly ahead of schedule — as it speeds away from Earth.

On Friday, Aug. 31, flight controllers at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland performed a second planned Trajectory Correction Maneuver (TCM-2), a thruster burn which lasted for seven minutes and five seconds. This maneuver, which was executed with a high degree of precision, adjusted the direction of the spacecraft to position it for its Venus flyby on Oct. 3, when it will use Venus' gravity to shed speed and draw its orbit closer to the Sun in preparation for its first solar approach.

On Sept. 2, four two-meter electric field antennas, part of the FIELDS instrument suite, were deployed. These antennas (as well as a fifth, which is mounted on the long boom at the other end of Parker Solar Probe) need to be extended away from the spacecraft to accurately measure the electric fields of the corona. These four antennas are not protected by Parker Solar Probe's Thermal Protection System, or heat shield, so they are made of niobium C-103, a high-temperature alloy that can withstand the intense solar heat.

Just a few hours after the FIELDS antennas were deployed, the Solar Wind Electrons Alphas and Protons (SWEAP) investigation team successfully opened the covers of two instruments, the Solar Probe Analyzer (SPAN) instruments. The SPAN instruments are used to measure the solar wind when it is coming in at an angle relative to the spacecraft.

Before opening the SPAN instrument doors, the team ramped up high voltages on the Solar Probe Cup (SPC) instrument, also part of SWEAP. Solar Probe Cup measures the thermal solar wind plasma flowing radially from the Sun — requiring this instrument to be mounted outside the heat shield and pointed directly at the Sun. Like the FIELDS antennas, Solar Probe Cup is constructed of niobium C-103.

Спойлер

An artist's concept of Parker Solar Probe in space. The FIELDS antennas extend out from behind the heat shield, and the Solar Probe Cup is visible on the right. Credit: NASA/JHUAPL

Other systems and instruments have completed checkouts as well. The spacecraft's high gain antenna — which will be used to send high-rate science data to Earth — has been moved through its full range of motion.

EPI-Lo and EPI-Hi, the two Energetic Particle Instruments that make up the IS☉IS suite (pronounced "ee-sis" and short for Integrated Science Investigation of the Sun), have been turned on and have completed low voltage checks.

The Wide-field Imager for Solar Probe (WISPR) instrument has been turned on and has taken closed-door test images to calibrate the systems and imagers.

"The spacecraft continues to perform as designed, and thanks to the team's careful planning and execution, we're commissioning instruments slightly ahead of schedule," said APL's Andy Driesman, Parker Solar Probe project manager.

"The science team is excited to begin the investigation phase of the mission," said Nour Raouafi of APL, Parker Solar Probe project scientist. "We're looking forward to seeing this initial science data and getting our first look at what we know will be many discoveries that Parker Solar Probe will make."

[свернуть]

As of 12 p.m. EDT on Sept. 4, Parker Solar Probe was more than 15 million miles from Earth, travelling at about 44,700 miles per hour (72,000 kilometers per hour).

By Geoff Brown

Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab

[tnt22]

NASA's Mission to 'Kiss the Sun' Launches in 360 Degrees

NASAKennedy

Опубликовано: 5 сент. 2018 г.

Watch in 360 degrees as a United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy rocket lifts off from Space Launch Complex-37 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida carrying NASA's Parker Solar Probe. Roughly the size of a small car, the spacecraft lifted off at 3:31 a.m. EDT on Aug. 12, 2018, starting its historic mission to the Sun.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kr78OOr2sCchttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kr78OOr2sCc (3:27)

[tnt22]

ULA‏Подлинная учетная запись @ulalaunch 3 ч. назад

Behind the scenes as the Mobile Service Tower rolls back from the #DeltaIV Heavy with the Parker #SolarProbe? ULA's @torybruno and @smartereverydaytake you there.

Launch Pad Tour with Tory Bruno, CEO of ULA (Delta IV Heavy) - Smarter Every Day 199

SmarterEveryDay

Опубликовано: 2 сент. 2018 г.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdPoVi_h0r0https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdPoVi_h0r0 (13:55)

[tnt22]

NASA Sun & Space‏Подлинная учетная запись @NASASun 3 ч. назад

#ParkerSolarProbe is 16.36 million miles from us and traveling at 45,905 miles per hour, as of 1pm ET today. Want to track the spacecraft as it speeds towards the Sun? Follow along:

http://parkersolarprobe.jhuapl.edu/The-Mission/index.php#Where-Is-PSP ...

Stats update once an hour.

[tnt22]

MASA Planetary Log‏ @MASA_06R 1 ч. назад

Test Drawing 2: October 3, 2018 #ParkerSolarProbe meets Venus and #AKATSUKI Venus Climate Orbiter.
太陽探査機「パーカー・ソーラー・プローブ」金星スウィングバイ試し描き。

[tnt22]

https://blogs.nasa.gov/parkersolarprobe/2018/09/14/parker-solar-probes-solar-array-cooling-system-fully-activated/

Parker Solar Probe's Solar Array Cooling System Fully Activated

Sarah Frazier
Posted Sep 14, 2018 at 3:00 pm

On Sept. 13, Parker Solar Probe's first-of-its-kind water-cooled Solar Array Cooling System (or SACS) was made fully operational. The SACS will protect Parker Solar Probe's solar arrays — responsible for powering the spacecraft — from the intense heat of the Sun.

Though the solar arrays rely on the Sun's energy to create electrical power for the spacecraft, they're also very sensitive to overheating, and Parker Solar Probe is the first scientific mission to use a water-cooled solar array thermal management system. Water flows through mini-channels embedded in the solar arrays to absorb heat, then flows into four radiators to release that heat into space. This keeps the solar panels cool while near the Sun, allowing them to efficiently generate power for the spacecraft.

Though the Sun-facing side of Parker Solar Probe's heat shield will reach temperatures as high as 2,500 degrees Fahrenheit when the spacecraft is close to the Sun, the SACS will keep the solar arrays — partially exposed to the Sun's direct radiation — at less than 302 degrees.

Спойлер

NASA's Parker Solar Probe is shown here mated to its third stage rocket motor on July 16, 2018, at Astrotech Space Operations in Titusville, Florida. The Solar Array Cooling System uses large black radiators, at the top of the spacecraft, to cool water that flows through portions of the solar arrays, bottom left. Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins APL/Ed Whitman

As planned, the cooling system came partially online shortly after launch on Aug. 12. Roughly one hour after Parker Solar Probe's 3:31 a.m. EDT launch, the spacecraft autonomously released the launch locks on its two solar arrays and deployed the panels. The spacecraft then released approximately two-thirds of a gallon of deionized water from a heated tank into two of four large radiators, mounted just below the spacecraft's heat shield.

Then on Sept. 13, at around 11 p.m. EDT — when the spacecraft had reached a distance of about 84 million miles (135 million kilometers) from the Sun — the remaining one-third of a gallon of water was released, activating the last two radiators and making the SACS fully operational. These events were controlled by the mission operations team at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab in Laurel, Maryland.

"There are a number of technological breakthroughs on Parker Solar Probe that make the mission possible," said APL's Andy Driesman, project manager for mission. "The Solar Array Cooling System is really the heart and circulatory system of the spacecraft. Without it, the solar arrays would not survive the heat from the Sun, and we would not be able to operate the instruments that will explore the Sun's corona and the systems that protect the spacecraft from the intense solar environment."

As of 12 p.m. EDT on Sept. 14, Parker Solar Probe was 21 million miles (34 million km) from Earth, traveling at about 51,000 miles per hour (82,000 kph). Track the spacecraft's progress online.

By Geoff Brown

Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab

[свернуть]

[tnt22]

https://blogs.nasa.gov/parkersolarprobe/2018/09/19/illuminating-first-light-data-from-parker-solar-probe/

Illuminating First Light Data fr om Parker Solar Probe

Sarah Frazier
Posted Sep 19, 2018 at 12:01 pm

Just over a month into its mission, Parker Solar Probe has returned first-light data from each of its four instrument suites. These early observations – while not yet examples of the key science observations Parker Solar Probe will take closer to the Sun – show that each of the instruments is working well. The instruments work in tandem to measure the Sun's electric and magnetic fields, particles from the Sun and the solar wind, and capture images of the environment around the spacecraft.

"All instruments returned data that not only serves for calibration, but also captures glimpses of what we expect them to measure near the Sun to solve the mysteries of the solar atmosphere, the corona," said Nour Raouafi, Parker Solar Probe project scientist at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab in Laurel, Maryland.

The mission's first close approach to the Sun will be in November 2018, but even now, the instruments are able to gather measurements of what's happening in the solar wind closer to Earth. Let's take a look at what they've seen so far.

WISPR (Wide-field Imager for Solar Probe)

Спойлер

As the only imager on Parker Solar Probe, WISPR will provide the clearest-yet glimpse of the solar wind from within the Sun's corona. Comprising two telescopes, WISPR sits behind the heat shield between two antennae from the FIELDS instrument suite. The telescopes were covered by a protective door during launch to keep them safe.

WISPR was turned on in early September 2018 and took closed-door test images for calibration. On Sept. 9, WISPR's door was opened, allowing the instrument to take the first images during its journey to the Sun.


The right side of this image — from WISPR's inner telescope — has a 40-degree field of view, with its right edge 58.5 degrees from the Sun's center. The left side of the image is from WISPR's outer telescope, which has a 58-degree field of view and extends to about 160 degrees from the Sun. There is a parallax of about 13 degrees in the apparent position of the Sun as viewed from Earth and from Parker Solar Probe. Credit: NASA/Naval Research Laboratory/Parker Solar Probe

Download these images in HD formats from NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio. 

Russ Howard, WISPR principal investigator from the Naval Research Laboratory, studied the images to determine the instrument was pointing as expected, using celestial landmarks as a guide.

"There is a very distinctive cluster of stars on the overlap of the two images. The brightest is the star Antares-alpha, which is in the constellation Scorpius and is about 90 degrees from the Sun," said Howard.

The Sun, not visible in the image, is far off to the right of the image's right edge. The planet Jupiter is visible in the image captured by WISPR's inner telescope — it's the bright object slightly right of center in the right-hand panel of the image.

"The left side of the photo shows a beautiful image of the Milky Way, looking at the galactic center," said Howard.

The exposure time – i.e. the length of time that light was gathered for this image, an interval which can be shortened or lengthened to make the image darker or brighter – is on the lower end, and there's a reason: "We intentionally wanted to be on the low side in case there was something very bright when we first turned on, but it is primarily because we are looking so far from the Sun," explains Howard.

As the spacecraft approaches the Sun, its orientation will change, and so will WISPR's images. With each solar orbit, WISPR will capture images of the structures flowing out from the corona. While measurements have been made before by other instruments at a distance of 1 AU – or approximately 93 million miles – WISPR will get much closer, about 95% of the way to the Sun from Earth, dramatically increasing the ability to see what's occurring in that region with a much finer scale than ever before and providing a more pristine picture of the solar corona.

[свернуть]

ISʘIS (Integrated Science Investigation of the Sun)

Спойлер

Credit: NASA/Princeton University/Parker Solar Probe

ISʘIS (pronounced "ee-sis" and including the symbol for the Sun in its acronym) measures high-energy particles associated solar activity like flares and coronal mass ejections. (The mission's other particle instrument suite, SWEAP, focuses on low-energy particles that make up the solar wind.) ISʘIS' two Energetic Particle Instruments cover a range of energies for these activity-driven particles: EPI-Lo focuses on the lower end of the energy spectrum, while EPI-Hi measures the more energetic particles. Both instruments have gathered data under low voltage, making sure their detectors work as expected. As Parker Solar Probe approaches the Sun, they will be fully powered on to measure particles within the Sun's corona.

EPI-Lo's initial data, on the left, shows background cosmic rays, particles that were energized and came rocketing into our solar system from elsewh ere in the galaxy. As EPI-Lo's high voltage is turned on and Parker Solar Probe gets closer to the Sun, the particles measured will shift toward solar energetic particles, which are accelerated in bursts and come streaming out from the Sun and corona.

On the right, data from EPI-Hi shows detections of both hydrogen and helium particles from its lower-energy telescopes. Nearer to the Sun, scientists expect to see many more of these particles — along with heavier elements — as well as some particles with much higher energies, especially during solar energetic particle events.

"The ISʘIS team is delighted with instrument turn-on so far," said David McComas, Professor of Astrophysical Sciences at Princeton University and principal investigator of the ISʘIS instrument suite. "There are a few more steps to go, but so far everything looks great!"

[свернуть]

FIELDS

Спойлер

The FIELDS instrument suite aboard Parker Solar Probe captures the scale and shape of electric and magnetic fields in the Sun's atmosphere. These are key measurements to understanding why the Sun's corona is hundreds of times hotter than its surface below.


Credit: NASA/UC Berkeley/Parker Solar Probe

FIELDS' sensors include four two-meter electric field antennas — mounted at the front of the spacecraft, extending beyond the heat shield and exposed to the full brunt of the solar environment — as well as three magnetometers and a fifth, shorter electric field antenna mounted on a boom that extends from the back of the spacecraft.

The data above, gathered during the boom deployment shortly after the spacecraft's launch in August, shows how the magnetic field changes as the boom swung away from Parker Solar Probe. The early data is the magnetic field of the spacecraft itself, and the instruments measured a sharp drop in the magnetic field as the boom extended away from the spacecraft. Post-deployment, the instruments are measuring the magnetic field in the solar wind — illustrating the very reason such sensors need to be held out far from the spacecraft.


Credit: NASA/UC Berkeley/Parker Solar Probe/Wind

In early September, the four electric field antennas on the front of the spacecraft were successfully deployed — and almost immediately observed the signatures of a solar flare.

"During its commissioning time, FIELDS measured its first radio burst from a solar flare," said principal investigator Stuart Bale, of the Space Sciences Laboratory at the University of California, Berkeley. Such bursts of radio waves can be detected during solar flares — enormous eruptions of energy and light — and are associated with the energetic electrons that flares release. This radio burst was captured by the FIELDS electric field antennas, shown above with measurements from NASA's Wind spacecraft (on the top) for comparison.

"FIELDS is one of the most comprehensive fields and waves suites ever flown in space, and it is performing beautifully," said Bale.

[свернуть]

SWEAP (Solar Wind Electrons Alphas and Protons)

Спойлер

Credit: NASA/University of Michigan/Parker Solar Probe

The SWEAP suite includes three instruments: Two Solar Probe Analyzers measure electrons and ions in the solar wind, while the Solar Probe Cup sticks out from behind Parker Solar Probe's heat shield to measure the solar wind directly as it streams off the Sun. After opening covers, turning on high voltages and running internal diagnostics, all three instruments caught glimpses of the solar wind itself.

Because of Parker Solar Probe's position and orientation, the science team expected that Solar Probe Cup would mostly measure background noise at first, without picking up the solar wind. But just after the instrument was powered on, a sudden, intense gust of solar wind blew into the cup, visible in the data as the red streak. As the spacecraft approaches the Sun, such observations will be Solar Probe Cup's bread and butter — and will hopefully reveal new information about the processes that heat and accelerate the solar wind.


Credit: NASA/University of Michigan/Parker Solar Probe

The two Solar Probe Analyzers (SPAN) also caught early peeks of the solar wind. During commissioning, the team turned the spacecraft so that SPAN-A — one of the two SPAN instruments — was exposed to the solar wind directly. It captured about 20 minutes' worth of data (right), including measurements of solar wind ions (top) and electrons (bottom). While SPAN-A and its sister instrument, SPAN-B, will measure solar wind electrons throughout the mission, the spacecraft's orientation now means that SPAN-A will likely go several more years before it captures such ion measurements again. This is because solar wind electrons can be measured from any direction, as their low mass and high temperature make their motion much more random, while the much heavier solar wind ions follow a relatively direct path out from the Sun.

"SWEAP's solar wind and corona plasma instrument performance has been very promising," said Justin Kasper, principal investigator of the SWEAP instrument suite at University of Michigan. "Our preliminary results just after turn-on suggest we have a set of highly sensitive instruments that will allow us to do amazing science close to the Sun."

[свернуть]

Download these images in HD formats from NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio. 

By Sarah Frazier (NASA) & Justyna Surowiec (APL)

NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.

Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab, Laurel, Md.

[tnt22]

Countdown to T-Zero: Now Flying Faster, Hotter and Closer Than Ever to the Sun - 2

NASAKennedy

Опубликовано: 19 сент. 2018 г.

Following years of work and preparation, a United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy rocket launched NASA's Parker Solar Probe for an unprecedented mission to "kiss the Sun." The spacecraft aims to unravel 60 years' worth of mysteries surrounding the Sun's corona and how it effects life on Earth .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yif4iu4QDNIhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yif4iu4QDNI (14:41)

[tnt22]

https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2018/three-nasa-missions-return-1st-light-data

Sept. 21, 2018

Three NASA Missions Return 1st-Light Data

NASA's continued quest to explore our solar system and beyond received a boost of new information this week with three key missions proving not only that they are up and running, but that their science potential is exceptional. On Sept. 17, 2018, TESS — the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite — shared its first science observations. Later in the week, the latest two missions to join NASA's heliophysics fleet returned first light data: Parker Solar Probe, humanity's first mission to "touch" the Sun, and GOLD, a mission that studies the dynamic boundary between Earth and space.
...
Together, the two other missions represent two key observation points in the giant system of space — dominated by particles and magnetic energy from the Sun — studied by the field of heliophysics. Parker Solar Probe will help us understand how the Sun's atmosphere drives particles out into space; ... The two viewpoints support heliophysics' focus on our star and how it influences the very nature of space — and, in turn, the atmospheres of planets and human technology.

In early September, each of Parker Solar Probe's four instrument suites powered on and returned their first observations on the spacecraft's journey to the Sun. While the data are not yet examples of the key science observations the spacecraft will take closer to the Sun, they show that each of the instruments is working well.

The instruments work in tandem to measure the Sun's electric and magnetic fields, and particles from the Sun and solar wind. They also capture images of the solar wind environment around the spacecraft. The mission's first close approach to the Sun will be in early November 2018, but even now, still outside the orbit of Venus, the instruments indicate they're ready to gather measurements of what's happening in the solar wind.

"All instruments returned data that not only serves for calibration, but also captures glimpses of what we expect them to measure near the Sun to solve the mysteries of the solar atmosphere, the corona," said Nour Raouafi, Parker Solar Probe project scientist at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab in Laurel, Maryland.

Спойлер

These are the first images from WISPR, short for the Wide-field Imager for Parker Solar Probe. Researchers studied the images to determine the instrument was pointed as expected, using celestial landmarks as their guide. The left image shows the Milky Way, looking at the galactic center. In the right image, there is a distinctive cluster of four stars near the right edge that is in the constellation Scorpius. The planet Jupiter is also visible in the right image as the bright object slightly right of center. The Sun, not visible in the image, is far off to the right of the image's right edge.
Credits: NASA/Naval Research Laboratory/Parker Solar Probe

WISPR, the mission's only onboard imager, captured the first snapshots from its journey to the Sun on Sept. 9, 2018. Similarly, the FIELDS instrument suite provided the first magnetic field observations and even captured a burst of radio waves, signatures of a solar flare. One of the SWEAP instruments sampled its first gust of solar wind, and the ISʘIS instrument — pronounced "ee-sis" and including the symbol for the Sun in its acronym — successfully measured the energetic particle environment.
...
Meanwhile, Parker Solar Probe will travel into the blazing corona, closer to the Sun than any spacecraft before it. The mission seeks to answer fundamental questions about the Sun — questions that lie at the root of understanding how solar activity shapes space weather across the solar system.
...
Parker Solar Probe is part of NASA's Living with a Star Program, or LWS, to explore aspects of the Sun-Earth system that directly affect life and society. LWS is managed by Goddard for the Heliophysics Division of NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. Johns Hopkins APL manages the Parker Solar Probe mission for NASA. APL designed, built and operates the spacecraft.
...
By Lina Tran
NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.

[свернуть]

Last Updated: Sept. 21, 2018
Editor: Rob Garner