Solar Orbiter is the most complex scientific laboratory ever to have been sent to our life-giving star, taking images of the Sun from closer than any spacecraft before and being the first to look at its polar regions.

A heliocentric orbit (also called circumsolar orbit) is an orbit around the barycenter of the Solar System, which is usually located within or very near the surface of the Sun. All planets, comets, and asteroids in the Solar System, and the Sun itself are in such orbits, as are many artificial probes and pieces of debris. The moons of planets ...

The Solar Orbiter spacecraft is a Sun-pointed, three-axis stabilised platform with a dedicated heat shield to provide protection from the high levels of solar flux near perihelion. The spacecraft provides a stable platform to accommodate the combination of remote-sensing and in situ instrumentation in an electromagnetically clean environment.

ESA’s Solar Orbiter mission is conceived to perform a close-up study of our Sun and inner heliosphere - the uncharted innermost regions of our Solar System - to better understand, and even predict, the unruly behaviour of the star on which our lives depend.

Jan 24, 2025 · An international cooperative mission between the European Space Agency (ESA) and NASA, Solar Orbiter is a Sun-observing satellite with 10 science instruments, all designed to provide unprecedented insight into how our local star 'works.'

A Sun-synchronous orbit (SSO), also called a heliosynchronous orbit, [1] is a nearly polar orbit around a planet, in which the satellite passes over any given point of the planet's surface at the same local mean solar time.

May 28, 2020 · The interactive ‘Where is Solar Orbiter’ tool below allows you to explore the mission’s trajectory including the gravity-assist flybys and follow the position of the spacecraft every single day of its journey.

NASA’s Solar System Interactive (also known as the Orrery) is a live look at the solar system, its planets, moons, comets, and asteroids, as well as the real-time locations of dozens of NASA missions.

Feb 12, 2020 · Since the beginning of the 1990s, six unprecedented spacecraft built in Europe for the Ulysses, SOHO and Cluster missions have been investigating the Sun and its impact on our planet. With Solar Orbiter, we will take a close approach to …

Feb 10, 2020 · It will take Solar Orbiter about two years to reach its primary science orbit. Solar Orbiter combines two main modes of study. In-situ instruments will measure the environment around the spacecraft, detecting such things as electric …