Indian space odyssey touched a new high in 2023

Indian space odyssey touched a new high in 2023 after it became the first country to successfully soft land an unmanned spacecraft on the moon’s south pole with its Chandrayaan-3 mission.

India’s space research agency, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), also attracted international admiration after it successfully conducted the Aditya-L1 mission to observe the dynamics of the Sun’s chromosphere and corona last year.

India’s union cabinet recently passed a resolution on the success of the lunar mission, calling it a victory for the country as well as ISRO.

Chandrayaan-3 mission’s success also received appreciation from the global leaders.

Taking forward the country’s “walk to space”, ISRO started 2024 with a big announcement as the space agency declared the names of four astronauts for its Gaganyaan mission, which is India’s first human space flight programme.

Besides Gaganyaan-1 programme, the ISRO also unveiled a compelling line-up of several other ground-breaking missions in 2024. India’s space research agency’s ventures — from probing the mysteries of cosmic X-rays to launching India’s first X-Ray Polarimeter Satellite — have promised to redefine the understanding of Earth, explore the depths of space, and set the stage for unprecedented human spaceflight.

PSLV-C58 with XPoSat

ISRO’s 2024 started with the successful launch of the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV-C58) carrying XPoSat, the country’s first X-Ray Polarimeter Satellite.

The Indian space research agency lifted off PSLV-C58, which successfully launched XPoSat satellite into an Eastward low inclination orbit on January 01.

According to ISRO, X-ray Polarimeter Satellite or XPoSat is the first dedicated scientific satellite from ISRO to carry out research in space-based polarisation measurements of X-ray emission from celestial sources.

It carries two payloads namely POLIX (Polarimeter Instrument in X-rays) and XSPECT (X-ray Spectroscopy and Timing), as per ISRO.

ISRO said the main objectives of this mission include measuring polarisation of X-rays in the energy band 8-30keV emanating from about 50 potential cosmic sources, carrying out long term spectral and temporal studies of cosmic X-ray sources in the energy band 0.8-15keV, and conducting polarisation and spectroscopic measurements of X-ray emissions from cosmic sources.

NISAR

The NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar (NISAR) mission represents a pathbreaking collaboration between India’s ISRO and the United States’ NASA.

According to ISRO, NISAR is a Low Earth Orbit (LEO) observatory being jointly developed by the two leading space agencies.