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That's right.

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So NASA's Parker Solar Probe,
which launched in 2018,

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has been using Venus gravity assist
to get closer and closer to the sun.

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And most recently,
it had a Venus gravity assist.

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And so now it's going to fly within 3.83
million miles of the surface of the sun,

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which is closer than any human made
object has ever gone

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before.

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That's right.

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Even though

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the sun is a constant in our sky,
the sun is not constant at all.

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The sun constantly has magnetic explosions
and little bursts of energy

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that come out, and sometimes
big burst of energy like the solar storms.

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And by measuring that process,
as it happens,

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so close to where its original energy
source was, we can really understand

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more about the energization and the

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the structures
as they evolve through the solar system.

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I am so excited about

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Parker touching the top edges of the,

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corona, the solar corona,
the outer atmosphere of the sun,

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and by measuring it in such detail
so close,

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we can combine that
with what we already know about the sun

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and the solar system
and that that material as that

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fills the solar system
from our other spacecraft.

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But by putting all of these pieces
together, we can really learn more

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about the solar corona
and that material as it fills

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our solar system.

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So during a total solar eclipse,
that's when the moon comes

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between us here on the Earth and the sun,
and it blocks out the main bright

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part of the sun

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so that we can see the solar corona,
the outer atmosphere of the sun.

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That outer atmosphere is extremely hot

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and it flows outwards,
filling our solar system.

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And Parker is flying through the outer
reaches of that solar corona.

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Really understanding how that energy is
put into that material in the first place.

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Yeah, NASA has a number of cool
missions coming up.

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One of the missions is called Punch.

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Punch has,

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3D imaging capability.

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So it's going to be able

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to see the corona in three dimensions,
the outer atmosphere of the sun,

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and watch that corona as it
expands outwards into the solar system

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and CODEX, which is, coronagraph
that's on the International Space Station.

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So that also is going to be looking
at the corona

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and measuring the temperature
and the velocity of that,

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of that material as it flows outwards,
which we can compare directly

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with what Parker measures in detail
in those outer

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reaches of the corona.

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We have

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never had a human made object
so close to the sun.

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To get that close, we had to use
Venus to have our gravity assist,

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to slow Parker down
so that it can get that close.

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Also, we had to not melt.

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That's why the Parker has this heat shield
that holds the instruments

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at room temperature
and keeps the heat of the sun away.

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And these are just amazing feats.

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And so it's so amazing
that we are so close

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and really getting to measure in detail
this material up close.

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You can learn

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more about Parker Solar Probe at NASA.gov/parker

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and you can also check
us out on @NASASun.