Tag: L1 Lagrange Point
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DSCOVR resumes operations after eight-month outage
Artist’s concept of the Deep Space Climate Observatory. Credit: NOAA The Deep Space Climate Observatory has resumed regular observations after NOAA and NASA engineers uplinked a software patch to the spacecraft a million miles from Earth, restoring data on space weather and a daily series views of the sunlit side of our home planet. The…
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LISA Pathfinder success bolsters plan for gravitational wave observatory
Artist’s concept of the LISA Pathfinder spacecraft. Credit: ESA–C. Carreau Europe’s LISA Pathfinder mission — a fundamental physics lab launched last year to a point a million miles from Earth — has demonstrated the mind-boggling technology required for a future space-based observatory to listen for faint, low-frequency vibrations emitted by invisible objects in the most…
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European probe blasts off on gravitational wave demonstration
Credit: ESA/CNES/Arianespace – Optique Video du CSG – S. Martin KOUROU, French Guiana — A solid-fueled Vega launcher fired through a low cloud deck and sped into orbit from the South American jungle early Thursday with a pioneering European spacecraft that marks a key step in a century-long quest to detect elusive gravitational waves predicted…
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Vega booster crowned with gravitational probe pathfinder
LISA Pathfinder and its orbit-raising propulsion module were enclosed inside the Vega rocket’s payload fairing Nov. 16. Credit: ESA-Manuel Pedoussaut, 2015 After criss-crossing Europe for a decade, the LISA Pathfinder satellite testbed has reached its last stop before launch in early December on a mission to demonstrate the delicate technologies required to detect elusive low-frequency gravitational…
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Launch campaign begins for Europe’s trailblazing gravity probe
ESA’s LISA Pathfinder spacecraft is seen inside IABG’s test center near Munich on Aug. 31. Credit: ESA–P. Sebirot, 2015 A compact European space probe, already fitted with a propulsive boost stage to send it a million miles from Earth, has arrived at its French Guiana launch base for liftoff in early December aboard a solid-fueled…
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DSCOVR space weather sentinel reaches finish line
The Deep Space Climate Observatory is operating at the L1 Lagrange point a million miles from Earth in line with the sun. Credit: NOAA A new space weather observatory launched in February has completed a four-month journey to an operating post a million miles from Earth, NOAA announced Monday. The $340 million mission will look…