ISRO's solar mission Aditya-L1 to be launched on September 2, says space agency

After the successful Chandrayaan-3 mission, ISRO on Monday announced the launch of Aditya-L1 spacecraft to study the Sun on September 2 at 11.50 am from the Sriharikota spaceport.

Aditya-L1 spacecraft is designed for providing remote observations of the solar corona and in-situ observations of the solar wind at L1 (Sun-Earth Lagrangian point), which is about 1.5 million kilometres from the Earth.

It will be the first dedicated Indian space mission for observations of the Sun to be launched by the Bengaluru-headquartered space agency.

The space agency said in a social media post that the spacecraft — the first space-based Indian observatory to study the Sun — would be launched by PSLV-C57 rocket.

The Aditya-L1 mission, aimed at studying the Sun from an orbit around the L1, would carry seven payloads to observe the photosphere, chromosphere and the outermost layers of the Sun, the corona, in different wavebands.

Aditya-L1 is a fully indigenous effort with the participation of national institutions, an ISRO official said.