NASA Selects Investigations for First Mission to Encounter the Sun
Portal origin URL: NASA Selects Investigations for First Mission to Encounter the SunPortal origin nid: 398556Published: Wednesday, March 15, 2017 - 14:33Featured (stick to top of list): noPortal text teaser: WASHINGTON - NASA has begun development of a mission to visit and study the sun closer than ever before. The unprecedented project, named Solar Probe Plus, is slated to launch no later than 2018. The small car-sized spacecraft will plunge directly into the sun's atmosphere approximately four million miles from our star's surface. It will explore a region no other spacecraft ever has encountered. NASA has selected five science investigations that will unlock the sun's biggest mysteries. "The experiments selected for Solar Probe Plus are specifically designed to solve two key questions of solar physics - why is the sun's outer atmosphere so much hotter than the sun's visible surface and what propels the solar wind that affects Earth and our solar system? " said Dick Fisher,...