The significance of India’s coronagraphy spacecraft attaining a halo orbit in early 2024 lies in what it can contribute to the advancement of human knowledge in the most modern age. Isro’s success lies in completing 110 days of intricate manoeuvring to get Aditya-L1 in a stable spot 1.5 million miles from the Sun from where it can study the centre of our solar system with an uninterrupted view.
The enormity of aiming missions to study the Sun, the fount of life on Planet Earth and perhaps other places in the galaxy too, can be ascertained from the fact that the Isro mission has seen its Aditya-L1 covering only about one percent of the distance to the Sun.
Given the enormous power and energy of the celestial object, the Lagrange Point, besides being an ideal location gravitationally, would suffice to study the Sun with the seven modern Aditya-L1 payloads that can not only see more clearly without occultations but also share additions to human knowledge, which can be stored in computers for posterity and, in fact, forever.
The beauty of the scientific community is it rises far above political considerations and can distribute all knowledge freely, which is what India has been doing with the results of its important study of the Moon after its landmark achievement in 2023 of landing Chandrayaan-3 in the Moon’s polar region.
India’s pride in its achievements in space, besides being able to power it with unbelievable economy in terms of project and maintenance cost while beating by a fair distance the big dollar budgets of Hollywood space extravaganzas, is enhanced by the participation of a multitude of dedicated women scientists who have displayed exemplary devotion to the cause while bringing great disciple to the working environment.
The woman heading the Aditya-L1 mission is credited with eight diligent years of leading her team to the apogee of triumph in placing it at the L1 point in the halo orbit enabling the best possible conditions to observe the photosphere, chromosphere, the Sun’s corona and solar particles and wind, while trying to understand its behavioural metrics as a star in its radiation, heat, particle flow, and magnetic fields, all relating to their impact on Earth.
India joined the club of space exploring nations some time ago and its status is preeminent now after the solar mission that confirms its admission to an even more exclusive club. Having taken a leap last year with its Moon mission success that rocked, India is also on the path for more missions with ISRO leading the way even as the private sector is joining in.
In an age of greater cooperation in space, simultaneously as the space race on as in countries trying to speed up their own Moon projects, it made sense for India to be part of the US-led Artemis Accords that will strive to put astronauts on the Moon by 2025.
With its Aditya-L1, India may have proved the breadth and versatility of its space programme that has led to Isro being marked as a space collaborator for programmes with far bigger budgets like those of Nasa and others.
They used to say the sky’s the limit. But that may have become aged as human exploration space programmes intend to push on with fanciful things like mining the Moon, new international space stations and missions to faraway planets. In a sense, Aditya-L1 will be a milestone even more than a landmark achievement as Indian space exploration raises its sights.
