About Parker Solar Probe:
- It was launched in 2018 and will travel through the sun’s atmosphere, closer to the surface than any spacecraft before it.
- In order to unlock the mysteries of the sun’s atmosphere this will use Venus’ gravity during seven flybys over nearly seven years to gradually bring its orbit closer to the sun.
Parker Solar Probe has three detailed science objectives:
- Trace the flow of energy that heats and accelerates the solar corona and solar wind.
- Determine the structure and dynamics of the plasma and magnetic fields at the sources of the solar wind.
- Explore mechanisms that accelerate and transport energetic particles.
