This NASA mission is preparing to get closer to the sun than any other spacecraft in history

investigating in NASA Parker Solar Probe The NASA team is preparing to make a historic close approach to the Sun scheduled for December 24, 2024, at a record speed of 195 kilometers per second. In an unprecedented event, the probe will approach the large star at a distance of only 6.1 million kilometers, which represents the fastest moving human-made object that will be closest to the sun.

“We are about to land on a star,” he said in an interview with The Sun. BBC Dr. Nour Rawafi, Parker Project Scientist at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory.

This mission, launched in 2018, aims to further investigate solar processes and improve space weather forecasts. During its closest approach to the sun, known as perihelion, the Parker Solar Probe will experience maximum temperatures of about 1,400 degrees Celsius at the front of the spacecraft.

The probe's strategy includes a brief data collection period within the solar environment Protected by a strong thermal shield. Science hopes to achieve significant progress in understanding the solar corona and the mechanisms behind its increasing temperature, as well as accelerating the flow of charged particles.

“This takes on a new dimension, especially since we are now thinking about sending women and men to the moon and even establishing a permanent presence on the moon’s surface,” Dr. Al-Rawafi declared, even comparing the importance of this mission to landing on the moon in 1969, highlighting its great importance to humanity.

Moreover, the implications of this research are fundamental to protecting communications on Earth and the safety of astronauts, especially in future lunar mission plans. Next year marks the culmination of Parker's mission. It will not be able to approach the Sun after December, in part because its path will no longer allow Venus to be used to adjust its path.

Dr. Nikki Fox, NASA's chief scientist and former principal scientist on the Parker project, highlighted that the flyby on December 24 will allow for a long stay in the solar corona, longer than has been achieved in previous missions. “We don't know what we'll find, but we'll be looking for waves in the solar wind associated with rising temperatures,” he said. “I suspect we will see many different types of waves that will indicate a combination of processes that people have been arguing about for years,” he said.

The Parker Solar Probe, developed by NASA, represents an unprecedented mission in the history of space exploration, whose primary goal is to study the Sun up close. Launched on August 12, 2018, this spacecraft was designed to get closer to the solar corona than any other spacecraft before, in order to collect valuable data on solar activity and the mechanisms that drive the solar wind and solar energy particles.

Equipped with a variety of scientific instruments, the Parker Solar Probe examines magnetic fields, plasmas, energetic particles and images the solar wind. The spacecraft uses a carbon composite heat shield that protects it from the Sun's extreme temperatures and radiation, allowing it to operate even when it is only about 6.16 million kilometers from the Sun's surface.

The information collected by this probe helps scientists better understand phenomena such as solar storms, which can have direct impacts on the operation of satellites, communications systems and electrical grids on Earth. In addition, the data obtained contribute to the study of space weather and provide a clearer view of how the Sun affects the space environment of the Solar System.

This mission, named after astrophysicist Eugene Parker, who proposed the existence of the solar wind in 1958, approached the Sun more times than initially planned, extending its duration and increasing the opportunity to study solar mysteries in great detail. The Parker Solar Probe is planned to make several orbits around the Sun, getting closer with each step and sending back valuable data that will change our understanding of the Sun.