Koronas-Foton (Russian: Коронас-Фотон), also known as CORONAS-Photon (Complex Orbital Observations Near-Earth of Activity of the Sun-Photon),[2] was a Russian solar research satellite. It was the third satellite in the Russian Coronas programme, and part of the international Living With a Star programme.[3] It was launched on 30 January 2009, from Site 32/2 at the Plesetsk Cosmodrome, aboard the final flight of the Tsyklon-3 rocket. On 1 December 2009 all scientific instruments on the satellite were turned off due to the problems with power supply that were caused by a design flaw.[4][5] On 18 April 2010 the creators of the satellite announced it was lost "with a good deal of certainty".[6][7]
The goal was to investigate the processes of free energy accumulation in the Sun's atmosphere, accelerated particle phenomena and solar flares, and the correlation between solar activity and geomagnetic storms on Earth.[8] Launch occurred successfully on 30 January 2009, and the first batch of science data was downloaded from the satellite on 19 February 2009.[9] The satellite operated in a 500 x 500 km x 82.5° polarlow Earth orbit[2] and was expected to have an operational lifetime of three years. It encountered power system problems during the first eclipse season, about six months after launch, and contact with the satellite was lost on 1 December 2009.[10] The satellite returned to life on December 29 after its solar panels received enough light to power its control systems,[citation needed] but attempts to revive the satellite failed, and the satellite was considered lost.[10][11]
On 5 July 2009, Koronas-Foton's TESIS telescope registered the most powerful solar outburst of the year so far, lasting 11 minutes, from 06:07 to 06:18 GMT. Solar X-ray peak intensity reached С2.7 in a 5-level scale used to classify solar flares. The last equally powerful outburst occurred on 25 March 2008.[12]
The satellite's scientific payload includeded an array of 12 instruments.[9] Eight instruments were designed for registering electromagnetic radiation from the Sun in a wide range of the spectrum from near electromagnetic waves to gamma-radiation,[clarification needed] as well as solar neutrons. Two instruments were designed to detect charged particles such as protons and electrons.[9]
Scientific instruments:
Natalya-2M spectrometer by MIFI, Moscow, Russia
RT-2 gamma-telescope by TIFR/ICSP/VSSC,[14] India.
Pingvin-M (Penguin) polarimeter by MIFI, Moscow, Russia
Konus-RF x-ray and gamma spectrometer by Ioffe Institute, Russia
BRM x-ray detector by MIFI, Russia
FOKA UV-detector by MIFI, Russia
TESIS telescope/spectrometer by FIAN, Russia, with SphinX soft X-ray spectrophotometer, SRC PAS, Poland
Electron-M-Peska charged particles analyser by NIIYaF MGU, Russia
STEP-F Electron and proton detector by Kharkov National University, Ukraine
SM-8M magnetometer by NPP Geologorazvedka/MIFI, Russia
Service systems:
SSRNI science data collection and registration system by IKI, Russia
Radio transmission system and antennas by RNII KP, Russia
^КОРОНАС-ФОТОН, по-видимому, умерArchived 2010-04-22 at the Wayback Machine [Coronas-Foton is apparently dead] (in Russian). Official press release of the Laboratory of X-Ray Astronomy of the Sun of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
Launches are separated by dots ( • ), payloads by commas ( , ), multiple names for the same satellite by slashes ( / ). Crewed flights are underlined. Launch failures are marked with the † sign. Payloads deployed from other spacecraft are (enclosed in parentheses).
