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On its way to the star of the day since February 9, 2020, the European - and somewhat American - space probe Solar Orbiter is heading towards the Sun. Four institutes and fourteen Swiss companies are involved in the realization of three instruments. A telescope developed by the FHNW and two image sensors from the PMOD/WRC Astronomical Observatory in Davos.

With Swiss precision, the Atlas V rocket sent the European (and somewhat American) probe towards our star of the day at exactly the right time, Sunday, February 9, 2020, at 23:03 (February 10, 2020, at 5:03, Switzerland). A great "space premiere" – an almost direct interview with an eye on the objective.

It has now become a classic of its kind, if not a routine: the Remote Camera. As I've already explained in my previous news, remote camera installation is a real obstacle course where you have to be patient.

We love the Sun, but it's a bit crazy. At 150 million km from us earthlings (93 million miles), this big cauldron born 5 billion years ago spits out flames that form a crown as hot as its center. Let me be more specific. At the heart of the Sun, the temperature is 15 million degrees C. (27 million degrees F.).

Good deal! Twenty years ago, when NASA was already interested in us to learn more about its crown, it wondered how to design a satellite that could rotate around the poles of this 42 million km furnace, or 1/3 of the distance separating us from the Sun. From then on, building a device just for an experiment (SoloHI from US Naval Research) would have cost a fortune. So, NASA turned to the European Space Agency (ESA) to offer scientific collaboration. The deal was concluded wit