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takyon [soylentnews.org] writes:

NASA's Solar Probe Plus [wikipedia.org] will travel extremely close to the Sun [thespacereporter.com] after years of repeated gravity assists from Venus. It is expected to reach a velocity of 200 km/s, becoming the fastest manmade object ever. The mission will study the Sun's magnetic fields, corona, solar wind, and nearby plasma:

The mission is designed to survive the harsh environment near the Sun, where the incident solar intensity is approximately 520 times the intensity at Earth orbit, by the use of a solar shadow-shield. The solar shield, at the front of the spacecraft, is made of reinforced carbon-carbon composite. The spacecraft systems, and the scientific instruments, are located in the umbra of the shield, where direct light from the sun is fully blocked. The primary power for the mission will be by use of a dual system of photovoltaic arrays. A primary photovoltaic array, used for the portion of the mission outside 0.25 AU, is retracted behind the shadow shield during the close approach to the Sun, and a much smaller secondary array powers the spacecraft through closest approach. This secondary array uses pumped-fluid cooling to maintain operating temperature.

The ESA's Solar Orbiter [wikipedia.org] will orbit further from the Sun and at a high inclination, allowing it to capture imagery from the Sun's poles [space.com]:

At nearly one-quarter of Earth's distance from the sun, Solar Orbiter will be exposed to sunlight 13 times more intense than what we feel on Earth. The spacecraft must also endure powerful bursts of atomic particles from explosions in the solar atmosphere," ESA said in a statement [esa.int]. "To withstand the harsh environment and extreme temperatures, Solar Orbiter must be well equipped. It will exploit new technologies being developed by ESA for the mission BepiColombo [space.com] to Mercury, the planet closest to the sun. This includes high-temperature solar arrays and a high-temperature high-gain antenna."

Solar Orbiter is expected to last seven years, orbiting with an orbital inclination of about 25 degrees relative to the sun's equator. If the mission is extended, more gravity assists at Venus will be used to change the spacecraft's inclination to 34 degrees. This will allow the spacecraft to pursue different science goals in the extended mission, ESA said.

While Solar Orbiter will approach the Sun at a distance of around 60 solar radii (0.284 AU), Solar Probe Plus will approach as close as around 8.5 solar radii (0.04 AU).

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