NASA To Embark On Historic Solar Probe Mission
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PHILADEPHIA (CBS) —Final preparations are underway for a historic NASA mission to touch the sun.
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Scientists will launch a rocket carrying the "Parker Solar Probe" at 3:33 a.m. Saturday at Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
The probe is designed to fly through the outermost part of the sun's atmosphere.
NASA hopes the probe will successfully travel through the sun's atmosphere, closer to the surface than any spacecraft before it. It will face brutal heat and radiation conditions before ultimately providing humanity with the closest-ever observations of a star.
The probe is named after Dr. Eugene Parker, of the University of Chicago, who is an American solar astrophysicist.
It's slated to arrive in about three months.
The probe will make 24 orbits of the sun and will get within 4 million miles of the star with the gravitational assist of seven Venus flybys.
Researchers hope to learn about solar winds and space weather.