Nasa mission lines up to 'touch the Sun'

A year from now, on December 24, Nasa's Parker Solar Probe will make a historic journey past the Sun. Traveling at an astonishing speed of 195 km/s, or 435,000 mph, it will be the fastest human-made object ever. Moreover, it will get closer to our star than any previous mission - just 6. 1 million km, or 3. 8 million miles from the Sun's surface. Dr Nour Raouafi, the Parker project scientist, likened this to almost landing on a star. He believes this will be a monumental achievement for humanity, akin to the Moon landing of 1969.

The probe's incredible speed is due to the immense gravitational pull it experiences as it falls towards the Sun. To put it in perspective, it's akin to flying from New York to London in under 30 seconds. Launched in 2018, the Parker Solar Probe is one of the most audacious missions ever conceived. Its goal is to make repeated, and ever closer, passes of the Sun. The late 2024 manoeuvre will take Parker to just 4% of the Sun-Earth distance.

However, this mission is not without its challenges. At perihelion, the point in the probe's orbit nearest the star, the temperature on the front of the spacecraft will likely reach 1,400C. The probe's strategy is to get in quick and get out quick, making measurements of the solar environment with a suite of instruments deployed from behind a thick heat shield. Researchers hope that this mission will yield breakthrough knowledge on some key solar processes, including the workings of the corona, the Sun's outer atmosphere.