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So why go to all this effort to “contact” the Sun?
Scientists hope that because the spacecraft passes by our star’s outer ambiance – its corona – it’s going to clear up an extended standing thriller.
“The corona is actually, actually scorching, and we don’t know why,” explains Dr Jenifer Millard, an astronomer at Fifth Star Labs in Wales.
“The floor of the Sun is about 6,000C or so, however the corona, this tenuous outer ambiance you can see throughout photo voltaic eclipses, reaches tens of millions of levels – and that’s additional away from the Sun. So how is that ambiance getting hotter?”
The mission also needs to assist scientists to higher perceive photo voltaic wind – the fixed stream of charged particles bursting out from the corona.
When these particles work together with the Earth’s magnetic discipline the sky lights up with dazzling auroras.
However this so-called area climate could cause issues too, knocking out energy grids, electronics and communication techniques.
“Understanding the Sun, its exercise, area climate, the photo voltaic wind, is so essential to our on a regular basis lives on Earth,” says Dr Millard.
