Observing the Sun from Space
--- space solar telescopes ---

24 June 2021 by Aki Takeda (Research Scientist at MSU Dept.of Physics)

1. Introduction

Sacrament Peak Solar Observatory
(New Mexico, USA)
The Hinode satellite and the Sun
(designed by K. Cerrillo, 2017 REU student)


2. Why we need to observe from space?



best sunspot observation from the ground (NST)
best sunspot observation from HINODE/SOT

3. Various Solar Space Missions

before that ... a scale model of the Sun/Earth/Moon system


Yohkoh
("sunshine" in Japanese)
1991 -- 2001 Japan/US/UK 1st CCD on-board, only solar mission early 1990s.     movie Loren Acton (MSU) was the PI of US side. (Loren in 1978)
SOHO
(SOlar and Heliospheric Observatory)
1996 -- present ESA/US L1 mission (Lagrange points)     image1
12 instruments on-board (EIT, LASCO, SUMER, MDI, ...) movie1 movie2
TRACE
(Transition Region And Coronal Explorer)
1998-- 2010 US Sun synchronous orbit ,     launched by airplane,
observes the small area of low corona with high spatial resolution .
Hinode
("sunrise" in Japanese)
2006 -- present Japan/US/UK SOT (biggest solar optical telescope in space), XRT and EIS
    movie1 movie2
STEREO
(Solar TErrestrial RElations Observatory)
2006 -- present US twin spacecrafts before and ahead of Earth in orbit.
STEREO orbit, current location (as of 2021/06/22)
image 2 angles image-3D Movie1
SDO
(Solar Dynamics Observatory)
2010 -- present US Geo-stationary satellite. AIA, HMI, and EVE. Stable, broad-band telemetry enables 10+ wavelengths, 4096x4096 every 12 sec.     movie    Solar Monitor
IRIS
(Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph)
2013 -- present US high resolution spectroscopy in UV range
launched by airplane, launch animation
PSP
(Parker Solar Probe)
2018 -- present US Eugene Parker, Parker Spiral
4 instruments on-board (FIELDS, WISPR, SWEAP and ISIS).
PSP instruments, PSP orbit
Solar Orbiter 2020 -- present ESA/US orbit_img1, orbit_img2 ,
space environment measurements
Solar-C 2025? -- Japan/US/UK EUVST
Ulysses 1990 -- 2009 ESA/US launched from Space Shuttle Discovery
Jupiter swing-by in 1992, observation of Sun's polar region


4. Summary