NASA has selected a science mission that
will allow astronomers to explore, for the first time, the hidden details of
some of the most extreme and exotic astronomical objects, such as stellar and
supermassive black holes, neutron stars and pulsars.
Objects such as black holes can heat
surrounding gases to more than a million degrees. The high-energy X-ray
radiation from this gas can be polarized – vibrating in a particular
direction. The Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE) mission will fly
three space telescopes with cameras capable of measuring the polarization of
these cosmic X-rays, allowing scientists to answer fundamental questions
about these turbulent and extreme environments where gravitational, electric
and magnetic fields are at their limits.
“We cannot directly image what’s going on
near objects like black holes and neutron stars, but studying the
polarization of X-rays emitted from their surrounding environments reveals
the physics of these enigmatic objects,” said Paul Hertz, astrophysics division
director for the Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in
Washington. “NASA has a great history of launching observatories in the
Astrophysics Explorers Program with new and unique observational
capabilities. IXPE will open a new window on the universe for astronomers to
peer through. Today, we can only guess what we will find.”
NASA's Astrophysics Explorers Program
requested proposals for new missions in September 2014. Fourteen proposals
were submitted, and three mission concepts were selected for additional
review by a panel of agency and external scientists. NASA determined the IXPE
proposal provided the best science potential and most feasible development
plan.
The mission, slated for launch in 2020,
will cost $188 million. This figure includes the cost of the launch vehicle
and post-launch operations and data analysis. Principal Investigator Martin
Weisskopf of NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, will
lead the mission. Ball Aerospace in Broomfield, Colorado, will provide the
spacecraft and mission integration. The Italian Space Agency will
contribute the polarization sensitive X-ray detectors, which were developed
in Italy.
NASA's Explorers Program provides frequent,
low-cost access to space using principal investigator-led space science
investigations relevant to the agency’s astrophysics and heliophysics
programs. The program has launched more than 90 missions, including Explorer
1 in 1958, which discovered the Van Allen radiation belts around the Earth,
and the Cosmic Background Explorer mission, which led to a Nobel Prize.
NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, manages the
Explorers Program for the agency's Science Mission Directorate.
For more information about the Explorers
program, visit:
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