India Launches First X-Ray Satellite to Study Black Holes
ISRO's XpoSat, the world's second mission of its kind, marks the 60th flight for India's PSLV-C58 launch vehicle.
- India's ISRO launched its first X-ray space observatory, the Polarimeter Satellite (XpoSat), into a low-Earth orbit to study cosmic X-ray sources such as black holes, neutron stars, active galactic nuclei, and magnetars.
- The launch marked the 60th flight for India's powerful launch vehicle, PSLV-C58, and XPoSat is the world's second mission of its kind after NASA's 2021 launch of the Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE).
- ISRO Chief S Somnath celebrated the successful launch and informed that the Aditya-L1 is set to reach the Lagrange Point on January 6.
- ISRO aims to have a minimum of 12 missions in 2024, depending on their ability to produce hardware and complete testing.
- The principal payload of the XPoSat is POLIX (Polarimeter Instrument in X-Rays), designed to measure polarimetry parameters, and XSPECT (X-ray Spectroscopy and Timing), crafted by the U R Rao Satellite Centre in Bengaluru.
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