ISRO’s space weather telescope | leader

Pune : ‘Ayuka’ has successfully built the Solar Ultraviolet Imaging Telescope which will soon be an integral part of the Aditya-L1 mission. At present this telescope has been handed over to ISRO by the Inter University Centre.

The telescope will travel approximately 1.5 million kilometers towards the Sun after its launch with the satellite and will continuously send updates and photos of the Sun’s background and space weather from the L-1 point.

Prof. A. N. Ram Prakash and Prof. Durgesh Tripathi planned this project. Also, constant contact with ISRO accelerated. The observations provided by this telescope will be particularly important in the ultraviolet region.

Elaborating on the project, Ramprakash said, ‘Aditya-L1 will be an important component of the Solar Ultraviolet Imaging Telescope’. The telescope is expected to acquire disk images in the 2000-4000 A wavelength range. Complete disc images in the full wavelength range have never been obtained before. Now, through this telescope, it is expected to get answers to some unanswered questions, mainly the existence of higher temperatures on cooler surfaces, the origin and variation of ultraviolet radiation, high energy explosions like solar flares.