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Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) Chairman S Somnath on Monday said that the Chandrayaan-3- the third edition of India’s mission to the moon- will be launched this July.

Chandrayaan-3 is a follow-on mission to Chandrayaan-2 to demonstrate end-to-end capability in safe landing and roving on the lunar surface.

“I am very confident…” said Somnath today on the lunar mission.

The ISRO chairman was speaking after the space agency successfully placed the NVS-01, the first of the second-generation satellite series, into geosynchronous transfer orbit. The Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle deployed the NVS-01 navigation satellite from the second launch pad at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDC SHAR) in Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh.

Speaking to ANI, Somanath said, “The lesson is very simple. Learn from the past, and do what is possible with your capacity. Failures may happen. There are a thousand reasons for a rocket to fail. Even today, this mission could have failed. But we have to do what is needed to be done”.

Meanwhile, the Chandraayan-3 mission consists of an indigenous lander module a propulsion module and a rover with an objective of developing and demonstrating new technologies required for Inter planetary missions.

According to ISRO, the three mission objectives of the Chandrayaan-3 are- to demonstrate safe and soft landing on lunar Surface; to demonstrate Rover roving on the moon and to conduct in-situ scientific experiments.

It will be launched by the LVM3 rocket from SDSC SHAR centre in Sriharikota. The propulsion module will carry the lander and rover configuration till 100 km lunar orbit, according to ISRO.

The propulsion module has Spectro-polarimetry of Habitable Planet Earth (SHAPE) payload to study the spectral and Polari metric measurements of Earth from the lunar orbit.

The Lander will have the capability to soft land at a specified lunar site and deploy the Rover which will carry out in-situ chemical analysis of the lunar surface during the course of its mobility. The Lander and the Rover have scientific payloads to carry out experiments on the lunar surface.

The main function of the Propulsion Module is to carry the Lander Module from launch vehicle injection till final lunar 100 km circular polar orbit and separate the Lander Module from the Propulsion Module.

Apart from this, the Propulsion Module also has one scientific payload as a value addition which will be operated post separation of Lander Module.

The launcher identified for Chandrayaan-3 is GSLV-Mk3 which will place the integrated module in an Elliptic Parking Orbit (EPO) of size 170 x 36500 km.

The Chandrayaan is an ongoing series of lunar space exploration programme of the ISRO. Chandrayaan-1, the first lunar probe of ISRO, in 2008-09 found water on the moon. The Chandrayaan-2 was launched in July 2019 and successfully inserted into orbit in August 2019. However, minutes its lander crash-landed on the moon after losing communication with the ground stations.

Earlier in the day, the ISRO Chairman Somnath congratulated the whole ISRO team after the successful launch of NVS-01.

“I would like to congratulate everyone on the outcome. The satellite is placed in the precised orbit. Congratulates to the entire ISRO for making this mission happen,” ISRO Chairman Somnath said in a press conference.

He appreciated the fact that the mission was accomplished after doing the rectifications after suffering a debacle during the last mission.

“This mission GV-F12 came after the debacle that happened in the F-10 mission where there was an issue in the cryogenic stage and the cryogenic engine could not get accomplished. I am very happy that the correction and modification at the cryogenic stage were done and we learnt the lessons to make our cryogenic stage more reliable. I want to specifically congratulate the entire ‘Failure Analysis Committee’ who went through this and made our life much better and also for the Liquid Propulsion System,” he said.

Somnath added, “Today the Navigation Satellite NVS-01 is the second generation of navigation satellite with additional capabilities that we have already brought into the satellite constellation where we make the signals more secure. We made a civilian frequency band L-1 and also introduced our Atomic Clock. And this is one of the five series of satellites with new configurations that are to be launched. I would like to thank all those who worked for this satellite and make the mission a grand success”.

Appreciating the government support, the ISRO Chairman also thanked the authorisation of the GSLV launch despite a failure during the last attempt.

“The confidence of the decision makers, our honourable Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other key functionaries who reviewed it to see that we have done the required work. The Navic Constellation is something very crucial for the nation to have a regional navigation constellation. I take this opportunity to tell you that we are going to make this Navic system fully functional and operational for the benefit of this nation,” he said.

He further said that the satellite is currently in Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit, from where it is the responsibility of the satellite team to correctly place it in the orbit.

Apprising about the future missions of ISRO, Chairman Somnath said, “In the coming months, we are going to launch PSLV as well as GSLV Mark-3. We are also going to launch the test vehicle of the Gaganyan (Man mission). Of course, the launches of further PSLV and SSLV are also in line”

“We are having the next launch of GSLV with a Climate and weather observation satellite called INSAT-3DS, which will be happening soon. And after that, the same rocket is bound to take NISR – India Nasa Synthetic Alergic Radar Satellite as well,” he added.


Samsung Galaxy A34 5G was recently launched by the company in India alongside the more expensive Galaxy A54 5G smartphone. How does this phone fare against the Nothing Phone 1 and the iQoo Neo 7? We discuss this and more on Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Orbital is available on Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavn, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.
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Aditya L1 Solar Mission Begins Studying Energetic Particles in Solar Wind

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Aditya L1 Solar Mission Begins Studying Energetic Particles in Solar Wind

After India’s solar mission, Aditya L1 began its journey towards Lagrange point 1 following a key manoeuvre, it has started studying energetic particles in the solar wind from space and will continue to do so for the rest of its life, a senior astrophysicist said. The study of the solar wind, the continuous flow of charged particles from the sun which permeates the solar system, will be carried out with the help of a device named Supra Thermal & Energetic Particle Spectrometer (STEPS), a part of the Aditya Solar wind Particle Experiment (ASPEX) payload.

“STEPS is now working from space. However, it was not sitting idle earlier. It has started functioning from within the magnetic field of the Earth since September 10 when Aditya was 52,000 kilometres above our planet,” Dr Dibyendu Chakrabarty, professor of Space and Atmospheric Sciences at the Physical Research Laboratory (PRL) said.
STEPS was developed by the PRL with support from the Space Application Centre (SAC) in Ahmedabad.

“During the travel time of four months (till Aditya L1 reaches its destination), it will study energetic particles in the solar wind. The data will help maintain the health and performance of our space assets in a better way,” Dr Chakrabarty told PTI.

The key aim of STEPS is to study the environment of energetic particles from the spacecraft’s position on the L1 point till it will function, he said. “The data from STEPS in the long term will also help us understand how space weather changes,” the space scientist said.

STEPS comprises six sensors, each observing in different directions and measuring supra-thermal and energetic ions. The data collected during the Earth’s orbits helps scientists to analyse the behaviour of particles surrounding the planet, especially in the presence of its magnetic field.

Aditya-L1, launched by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on September 2, will go up to the First Lagrangian point, about 1.5 million km from the Earth ISRO on September 18 said on X: “Off to Sun-Earth L1 point! The Trans-Lagrangean Point 1 Insertion (TL1I) manoeuvre is performed successfully. The spacecraft is now on a trajectory that will take it to the Sun-Earth L1 point.” Lagrangian points are where gravitational forces, acting between two objects, balance each other in such a way that the spacecraft can ‘hover’ for a longer period of time.

The L1 point is considered the most significant of the Lagrangian points, for solar observations, which were discovered by mathematician Joseph Louis Lagrange. 


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Elon Musk’s Neuralink Receives Approval to Start Brain Implant Human Trial

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Elon Musk's Neuralink Receives Approval to Start Brain Implant Human Trial

Billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk‘s brain-chip startup Neuralink said on Tuesday it has received approval from an independent review board to begin recruitment for the first human trial of its brain implant for paralysis patients.

Those with paralysis due to cervical spinal cord injury or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis may qualify for the study, it said but did not reveal how many participants would be enrolled in the trial, which will take about six years to complete.

The study will use a robot to surgically place a brain-computer interface (BCI) implant in a region of the brain that controls the intention to move, Neuralink said, adding that its initial goal is to enable people to control a computer cursor or keyboard using their thoughts alone.

The company, which had earlier hoped to receive approval to implant its device in 10 patients, was negotiating a lower number of patients with the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) after the agency raised safety concerns, according to current and former employees. It is not known how many patients the FDA ultimately approved.

Musk has grand ambitions for Neuralink, saying it would facilitate speedy surgical insertions of its chip devices to treat conditions like obesity, autism, depression and schizophrenia.

In May, the company said it had received clearance from the FDA for its first-in-human clinical trial when it was already under federal scrutiny for its handling of animal testing.

Even if the BCI device proves to be safe for human use, it would still potentially take more than a decade for the startup to secure commercial use clearance for it, according to experts.

© Thomson Reuters 2023


(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

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ISRO’s Aditya-L1 Performs TL1I Manoeuvre, Set to Reach Sun-Earth L1 Point

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Aditya L1 Solar Mission Begins Studying Energetic Particles in Solar Wind

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) announced on Tuesday that its maiden solar mission — Aditya-L1 — has performed the Trans-Lagrangean Point 1 Insertion (TL1I) manoeuvre successfully and the spacecraft was now in a trajectory that will take it to the Sun-Earth L1 point. ISRO also informed that it marked the fifth consecutive time that the ISRO had successfully transferred an object on a trajectory toward another celestial body or location in space.

A post on the ISRO official handle on social media platform X read, “Aditya-L1 Mission | Off to Sun-Earth L1 point | The Trans-Lagrangean Point 1 Insertion (TL1I) manoeuvre is performed successfully. The spacecraft is now on a trajectory that will take it to the Sun-Earth L1 point. It will be injected into an orbit around L1 through a manoeuvre after about 110 days. This is the fifth consecutive time ISRO has successfully transferred an object on a trajectory toward another celestial body or location in space.”

Earlier, a launcher carrying the Aditya-L1 spacecraft blasted off from the Satish Dhawan Space Station at Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh. The primary objectives of India’s maiden solar mission include collecting scientific data and marking another milestone in India’s solar exploration efforts.

The agency had earlier posted on X, “Aditya-L1 Mission: Aditya-L1 has commenced collecting scientific data. The sensors of the STEPS instrument have begun measuring supra-thermal and energetic ions and electrons at distances greater than 50,000 km from Earth. This data helps scientists analyze the behaviour of particles surrounding Earth. The figure displays variations in the energetic particle environment, collected by one of the units.”

The Supra Thermal and Energetic Particle Spectrometer (STEPS) instrument, a part of the Aditya Solar Wind Particle Experiment (ASPEX) payload, also started its data-gathering operations earlier. 


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