Heliospheric Future: Parker Solar Probe (formerly Solar Probe Plus) & Solar Orbiter

  • Released Thursday, September 20th, 2012
  • Updated Friday, August 25th, 2023 at 12:02AM
  • ID: 3966

Two future missions scheduled for detailed studies of the Sun and solar atmosphere are Parker Solar Probe and Solar Orbiter.

Parker Solar Probe will move in a highly-elliptical orbit, using gravity-assists from Venus to move it closer to the Sun with each pass. The goal is to get the spacecraft to fly through the corona at a distance of 9.5 solar radii.

Solar Orbiter will use Earth and Venus gravity assists to move into a relatively circular orbit, inside the orbit of Mercury for monitoring the Sun.



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Please give credit for this item to:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio


Missions

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Series

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Datasets used in this visualization

DE421 (A.K.A. JPL DE421)
Ephemeris NASA/JPL 2017-01-01 to 2027-02-26
SPICE Ephemerides (A.K.A. SPICE Ephemerides)
Ephemeris NASA/JPL Solar Orbiter: 2017-01-01 to 2027-02-26; Solar Probe Plus: 2018-07-31 to 2025-12-06

Satellite and planetary ephemerides

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