NASA's Parker Solar Probe is set to make history on December 24, 2024, by making humanity's closest-ever approach to the Sun, coming within 6.1 million kilometers (3.86 million miles) of the solar surface during its Christmas Eve flyby, according to ABC News. The spacecraft will fly at a speed of 690,000 kilometers per hour, breaking its own previous speed record of 635,266 kilometers per hour and making it the fastest human-made object ever recorded.
During this close approach, the Parker Solar Probe will cut through plumes of solar plasma, collecting vital data to help scientists better understand the Sun's behavior and its effects on Earth, ABC News reported. “No human-made object has ever passed this close to a star, so Parker will truly be returning data from uncharted territory,” said Nick Pinkine, Parker Solar Probe mission operations manager at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Maryland, according to the New York Post.
The probe, launched in August 2018, has been steadily moving closer to the Sun and, in October 2018, broke the record for being the closest a human-made object has ever gotten to the Sun at 26.55 million miles, ABC News noted. Equipped with a thermal shield designed to withstand temperatures of up to 1,400 degrees Celsius (2,500 °F), the spacecraft is prepared to face the extreme conditions near the solar surface, News9live reported.
Scientists estimate that during its closest approach, the Parker Solar Probe's heat shield will endure temperatures exceeding 1,371 degrees Celsius, Ars Technica stated. The mission aims to study the outermost part of the Sun's atmosphere, known as the corona, and is equipped with advanced scientific instruments to analyze magnetic fields, solar wind, energetic particles, and solar phenomena, ABC News reported.
By venturing so close to the Sun, the probe will allow scientists to measure the inner part of the solar wind and observe the birthplace of the highest-energy solar particles. "Getting a better understanding of what's happening in our local neighborhood really helps us protect our investments in space and the future of astronaut space travel," said Nicki Rayl, NASA deputy director of heliophysics.
Since its launch, the probe has revolutionized the understanding of the Sun, including the heating of the solar corona, which reaches temperatures hundreds of times higher than those of its surface, El Tiempo noted.
Named in honor of Eugene Parker, the pioneering astrophysicist who predicted the existence of solar wind, the Parker Solar Probe is the first NASA spacecraft named after a living person. Parker attended the probe's launch in 2018 and died in 2022 at the age of 94, Ars Technica reported.
During its closest approach, mission controllers will be unable to commu4nicate with the spacecraft, NBC News stated. Operators at the Johns Hopkins APL will attempt to confirm the probe's condition after the flyby on December 27.
The Parker Solar Probe recently completed a Venus flyby in November, which adjusted its speed and trajectory to enter its final orbit around the Sun. The probe uses gravitational assistance from Venus to fine-tune its path.
Operating during a solar maximum—the period of greatest solar activity in the Sun's eleven-year cycle—the Parker Solar Probe offers a remarkable opportunity for scientific research. By studying the corona up close, researchers hope to understand why the outer layer of the Sun's atmosphere is hundreds of times hotter than the Sun's surface, NBC News noted.
"If you can imagine, it's like going 96% of the way there to the sun's surface," said Kelly Korreck, according to NBC News. The mission could also help researchers better predict space weather and its possible consequences for Earth. "Now we'll be able to understand better how space weather forms, and when we see storms on the sun in our telescopes, we'll be able to say what that means for us here on Earth," Korreck stated.
This article was written in collaboration with generative AI company Alchemiq