NASA has chosen another mission that will enable scientists to comprehend and, finally, forecast space weather.
The Atmospheric Waves Experiment (AWE) mission will cost $42 million and is expected to launch in August 2022, attached to the outside of the Earth-orbiting International Space Station (ISS.
AWE will concentrate on colorful light bands in Earth's atmopshere, called airglow, From the space station perch, to figure out what blend of powers drive space weather in the upper atmopshere.
NASA's Director of Astrophysics, Paul Hertz said that “the mission absolutely meets that standard with a creative and cost-effective mission to solve mysteries about Earth's upper atmosphere”
Space weather is imperative since it can have significant effects - influencing astronauts in space and technology, causing disruptions in radio communications and, at its most extreme, overpowering power grids.
Earlier, it was thought the region could only be affected by Sun's constant outflow of ultraviolet light and particles, the solar wind. However, researchers have discovered that Earth’s weather may also be having some kind of an impact.
NASA said, AWE will examine how waves in the lower atmosphere, brought about by varieties in the densities of different air packets, sway the upper atmosphere.
Nasa additionally has chosen the Sun Radio Interferometer Space Experiment (SunRISE) for a seven-month, $100,000 broadened formulation study. It will be a variety of six CubeSats working like one vast radio telescope.
This mission would research how mammoth space weather storms speed up and are sent into planetary space.
While SunRISE has not yet exhibited its status for next phase of mission development, the proposed idea speaks to a convincing utilization of new NASA-created technology.
Image Credit: NOAA
