Which is the primary payload of India's Aditya-L1 solar observatory?
- A.Solar Ultraviolet Imaging Telescope
- B.Visible Emission Line Coronagraph
- C.Atmospheric Imaging Assembly
- D.Plasma Analyser Package
Correct answer
Explanation
The correct answer is the Visible Emission Line Coronagraph (VELC). Aditya-L1, India's first space-based solar observatory, carries seven payloads, and VELC is described as the primary one. It is an internally occulted coronagraph, which means it blocks the bright disk of the Sun so that the much fainter corona around it can be observed, and it can watch the corona in several modes at the same time. Option A is wrong because, although it is an instrument class associated with solar study, it was not named as the primary payload here. Option C is wrong and is the trap in this question: the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly belongs to NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory, whose images were combined with VELC data for this study. Option D is wrong because no such payload was identified as primary.
Read the full article: Aditya-L1 VELC Finds Solar Eruption Expands Asymmetrically
Practice Questions
What did the VELC observations reveal about the coronal mass ejection, for the first time?
- A.That it expanded as a perfectly symmetric bubble
- B.That it expanded non-uniformly and became asymmetric
- C.That it did not move towards the Earth at all
- D.That it carried no ionised iron
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Until this study a coronal mass ejection was thought to swell outward from the Sun like a simple symmetric bubble; the VELC spectra, read together with imaging from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory and a three-dimensional model, showed that the expansion was uneven.
Read the full explanation →Which institution designed and fabricated the VELC payload of Aditya-L1?
- A.Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad
- B.Indian Institute of Astrophysics
- C.Tata Institute of Fundamental Research
- D.Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics
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The coronagraph was designed and fabricated at the institute's MGK Menon Lab for Space Sciences on the CREST campus at Hosakote, with substantial support from ISRO, and the scientists who carried out this study also belong to the IIA: the lead author is Saurabh Tripathi, a research student there, the…
Read the full explanation →In which journal was the study on asymmetric expansion of the solar eruption published?
- A.Nature Astronomy
- B.Astrophysical Journal Letters
- C.Current Science
- D.Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
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The paper reporting that the coronal mass ejection did not expand as a symmetric bubble appeared in that journal, and it was based on the eruption that occurred on 5 August 2024, observed from an active region near the western limb of the Sun.
Read the full explanation →Which statement about global geothermal capacity at the end of 2025 is correct?
- A.It stood at 15.67 GW, with Indonesia among the leading countries
- B.It stood at 159.8 GW, led by China
- C.It stood at 45.2 GW, led by India
- D.It stood at 8.9 GW, led by Iceland
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Installed geothermal capacity across the world reached a little over fifteen and a half gigawatts by the close of that year, and five countries, namely Indonesia, the United States, the Philippines, Turkiye and New Zealand, together accounted for roughly sixty-seven per cent of it.
Read the full explanation →How many hot springs and geothermal provinces has the Geological Survey of India mapped?
- A.340 hot springs and 7 provinces
- B.381 hot springs and 10 provinces
- C.412 hot springs and 12 provinces
- D.381 hot springs and 14 provinces
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The provinces run across very different terrains, from the Himalayan belt and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands to the West Coast, the Cambay Graben, the Son-Narmada-Tapi zone and the cratonic region of southern India.
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