What is XPoSat, India’s first polarimetry mission?
- The Indian Space Research Organisation is collaborating with the Raman Research Institute (RRI), Bengaluru to build the X-Ray Polarimeter Satellite (XPoSat) that is scheduled to be launched later this year.
What is the XPoSat mission?
- XPoSat will study various dynamics of bright astronomical X-ray sources in extreme conditions.
- It has been billed as India’s first, and only the world’s second polarimetry mission that is meant to study various dynamics of bright astronomical X-ray sources in extreme conditions.
- The other such major mission is NASA’s Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE) that was launched in 2021.
How are X-Rays witnessed in space?
- X-rays have much higher energy and much shorter wavelengths, between 0.03 and 3 nanometers, so small that some x-rays are no bigger than a single atom of many elements.
- The physical temperature of an object determines the wavelength of the radiation it emits. The hotter the object, the shorter the wavelength of peak emission.
- X-rays come from objects that are millions of degrees Celsius — such as pulsars, galactic supernova remnants, and black holes.
- Like all forms of light, X-rays consist of moving electric and magnetic waves.
- Usually, peaks and valleys of these waves move in random directions.
- Polarised light is more organised with two types of waves vibrating in the same direction.
Prelims Take Away
- XPoSat
- ISRO
- Raman Research Institute
- Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer