Countdown starts for Isro's Astrosat launch on Monday

Astrosat, India's first space observatory, is a miniature version of Hubble, which has discovered new galaxies and improved understanding of the universe

Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) started the 50-hour countdown for the Astrosat Mission on Saturday. Astrosat, India’s first space observatory, is set to be launched on Monday. Astrosat is a miniature version of the Hubble, the US-European joint space observatory, which discovered new galaxies and improved understanding of the universe.

The mission will be launched through Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV)-C30. The Astrosat will be launched from Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota at 10 am on Monday. The Rs 178-crore Astrosat is India’s first space observatory. India’s observatory will be the fourth in space, after the Hubble, Russia’s Spektr R and Suzaku of Japan.

Astrosat, initially planned for 2005, was delayed by a decade, as the scientific community reportedly struggled to build with precision the instruments for such operations.

The instruments, spreading across ultraviolet and X-ray wavelengths, will study black holes, neutron stars, quasars, white dwarfs and pulsars.

“Astrosat is special due to the choice of instruments to study in multi-wave lengths — UV rays, visible and X-rays — which even the Hubble doesn’t have,” said A S Kiran Kumar, chairman, Isro, in a recent interview. “The instruments allow simultaneous observation of cosmic sources, an area in which other observatories currently have limitations.”

The diameter of Astrosat’s optical mirror is around 30 cm against Hubble’s 2.4 m. It is expected the US space agency will launch the James Webb observatory, a successor to the Hubble, in 2018.

The Astrosat will carry instruments of various Indian research labs such as the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, the Indian Institute of Astrophysics, the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics  and the Raman Research Institute. In addition, two payloads have sensors from the Canadian Space Agency and the University of Leicester, the UK.

The Isro’s planetary exploratory group and the Indian Institute of Science have also contributed to the spacecraft, which carries four X-ray payloads, a UV telescope and a charge particle monitor.

Six small satellites, including four from the US and one each from Indonesia and Canada, will be on board, which will place these satellites in the Earth’s lower orbit.

The US satellites are the first from that country to be launched from India since the two countries signed a technology safeguards agreement in 2009.