GEOTAIL

 

For: Preliminary & Mains

Topics covered:

• What is Geotail? How it is helping Chandrayan-2 to learn about moon?

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News Flash

ISRO tweeted that an instrument on Chandrayaan-2, CLASS, designed to detect signatures of elements in the Moon’s soil, had detected charged particles during the mission. This happened in September, during the orbiter’s passage through the “geotail”.

 

Geotail

The geotail is a region in space that allows the best observations. The region exists as a result of the interactions between the Sun and Earth.

 

CLASS instrument

• The CLASS instrument on Chandrayaan-2 is designed to detect direct signatures of elements present in the lunar soil.
• This is best observed when a solar flare on the Sun provides a rich source of x-rays to illuminate the lunar surface; secondary x-ray emission resulting from this can be detected by CLASS to directly detect the presence of key elements like Na, Ca, Al, Si, Ti and Fe.

 

How the geotail is formed?

• The Sun emits the solar wind, which is a continuous stream of charged particles. These particles are embedded in the extended magnetic field of the Sun.
• Since the Earth has a magnetic field, it obstructs the solar wind plasma. This interaction results in the formation of a magnetic envelope around Earth.
• On the Earth side facing the Sun, the envelope is compressed into a region that is approximately three to four times the Earth’s radius.
• On the opposite side, the envelope is stretched into a long tail, which extends beyond the orbit of the Moon. It is this tail that is called the geotail.
• Once every 29 days, the Moon traverses the geotail for about six days. When Chandrayaan-2, which is orbiting the Moon, crosses the geotail, its instruments can study the properties of the geotail.

 

 

Source: Indian Express

 

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