GSAT-30
Why in news? Recently, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has launched telecommunication satellite GSAT-30 into a Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO) from Kourou launch base, French Guiana by European Ariane-5 VA-251. Details: GSAT-30 satellite will replace INSAT-4A which was launched in 2005. A European communication satellite named EUTELSAT KONNECT was also launched with GSAT-30. GSAT-30 derives its heritage from ISRO’s earlier INSAT/GSAT satellite series and will replace INSAT-4A in orbit. […]
ARIES telescope
ARIES telescope is a joint collaboration between Indian, Russian, and Belgian scientists. The telescope is located at Devasthal, Nainital at a height of 2,500 metres The high end technology incorporated in the telescope enables it to be operated with the help of remote control from anywhere in the world The telescope will be used in […]
Chandra X-ray Observatory
Chandra is the world’s most powerful X-ray telescope. Chandra, named for Indian-American physicist Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar. It examines the X-rays emitted by some of the universe’s strangest objects, including quasars, immense clouds of gas and dust and particles sucked into black holes. X-rays are produced when matter is heated to millions of degrees.The hottest and most […]
Indian Neutrino project
The India-based Neutrino Observatory (INO) Project is a multi-institutional effort aimed at building a world-class underground laboratory with a rock cover of approx.1200 m for non-accelerator based high energy and nuclear physics research in India. The initial goal of INO is to study neutrinos. It is a mega-science project jointly funded by the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) and the Department of Science and […]
Telescope to Explore Origins of Universe: SPHEREx
NASA will launch a new space telescope mission Spectro-Photometer for the History of the Universe, Epoch of Reionization and Ices Explorer (SPHEREx) in 2023. The launch could help astronomers understand how the Universe evolved in the first place and how common the ingredients for life are within it. Missions’ Objective SPHEREx will survey the sky in optical as well as near-infrared light. […]
James Webb Space Telescope
The James Webb Space Telescope (also called JWST or Webb) will be a large infrared telescope with a 6.5-meter primary mirror. The telescope will be launched on an Ariane 5 rocket from French Guiana in 2021. It will study every phase in the history of our Universe, ranging from the first luminous glows after the Big Bang, to the formation of […]
Gravitational lensing
Using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope researchers plan to investigate how new stars are born. For this, a natural phenomenon called “Gravitational lensing” is to be used. The gravitational field of a massive object will extend far into space, and cause light rays passing close to that object to be bent and refocused somewhere else. […]
NASA’s Kepler Space telescope
While this is the first Earth-sized planet discovered by TESS, other Earth-sized exoplanets have been discovered in the past, mainly by NASA’s Kepler Space Telescope, a since-retired telescope that monitored more than 530,000 stars. In the end, the Kepler mission detected 2,662 planets, many of which were Earth-sized, and a handful of those were deemed to […]
Universe’s First Molecule
Scientists have detected the most ancient type of molecule in our universe in space for the first time ever. Helium hydride ion (HeH+) was the first molecule that formed when, almost 14 billion years ago, the falling temperatures allowed recombination of the light elements (hydrogen, helium, deuterium and traces of lithium) produced in the Big Bang. It is the first type of molecule […]
What are Gravitational Waves?
These waves are ‘ripples’ in space-time caused by some of the most violent and energetic processes in the Universe. The strongest gravitational waves are produced by catastrophic events such as colliding black holes, the collapse of stellar cores (supernovae), coalescing neutron stars or white dwarf stars, the slightly wobbly rotation of neutron stars that are […]