Varanasi physicist key player in US-UK-Japan Space Mission

Varanasi, May 8 (UNI) A solar physicist from the Banaras Hindu University (BHU) is one of the investigators to the US-UK-Japanese Solar-B Space Mission, to be launched in space by 2006, to study the ''anatomy of sun.'' Talking to UNI here today, senior Solar Physicist from Institute of Technology (IT-BHU), Dr B N Dwivedi said being an investigator to the ambitious project was an honour, as the spacecraft to be launched from Japan towards the end of the year will study the interaction between sun's magnetic field and its corona to increase the understanding of the causes of solar variability.

The Solar-B Space Craft is slated for launch from the Uchimoura Space Centre, Kagoshima (Japan) towards the 2006 end.

Being a follow-up mission to the very successful Japan/UK/US Yohkoh mission, the space craft to be launched by an M-V launching vehicle, will use a combination of optical, EUV and X-ray instrumentation, he added.

As an investigator to the ambitious project, Dr Dwivedi is providing the theoritical bases for further experimentation by the Solar-B Space Mission.

The solar physicist who was in February honoured with Department of Science and Tehchnology 'National Award for Outstanding Efforts in Science and Technology Communicattion through Books and Magazines' further said the Solar-B mission will also study features on sun's surface alongwith the strength and direction of its magnetic field with unprecedented precision.

By observing changes in strength and direction of the field at the surface, the Solar-B mission can deduce the nature of the very large magnetic field structures that exist high in the corona and to follow their behaviour over time, Dr Dwivedi said.

Solar-B will be able to study the magnetic field and its effects at a spatial resolution of 150 kilometres (the width of the flux tubes).

Understanding the role of the magnetic field is crucial to learning how the hot solar atmosphere is sustained and under what conditions it becomes unstable.

The design and construction of Solar-B was provided by Japan's Institute for Space and Astronautical Science. It will be equipped by US and Japanese groups with precision instrumentation for measurement of surface features and magnetic fields so as to study their evolution with time, Dr Dwivedi added.

Besides receiving the DST National Award on the eve of National Science Day in the National Capital February last, Dr Dwivedi has been involved in almost all the major solar space missions, including Skylab, Yohkoh, SOHO, TRACE and RHESSI.

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