Parker Solar Probe will swoop to within 4 million miles of the Sun's surface, facing heat and radiation like no spacecraft before it. Launched on Aug. 12, 2018, Parker Solar Probe will provide new data on solar activity and make critical contributions to our ability to forecast major space-weather events that impact life on Earth. In order to unlock the mysteries of the corona, but also to protect a society that is increasingly dependent on technology from the threats of space weather, we will send Parker Solar Probe to touch the Sun.
Organization
Launch Date
July 2018
Class
Flight Project
Websites
Key Staff
Data Processing Team Member
The Parker Solar Probe (formerly Solar Probe+) will be a historic mission, flying into the Sun's atmosphere (or corona), for the first time. Coming closer to the Sun than any previous spacecraft, the Parker Solar Probe will employ a combination of in situ measurements and imaging to achieve the mission's primary scientific goal: to understand how the Sun's corona is heated and how the solar wind is accelerated. The Parker Solar Probe will revolutionize our knowledge of the physics of the origin and evolution of the solar wind.
Related Publications
2026.
"Solar Wind Heating near the Sun: A Radial Evolution Approach.",
The Astrophysical Journal,
999
(2):
225
[10.3847/1538-4357/ae4582]
[Journal Article/Letter]
2025.
"Dual-band Ion-scale Waves in the Solar Wind: Statistical Properties and Comparison with Single-band Ion-scale Waves.",
The Astrophysical Journal Letters,
993
(1):
L8
[10.3847/2041-8213/ae112a]
[Journal Article/Letter]
2024.
"The Alfvén transition zone observed by the Parker Solar Probe in young solar wind – global properties and model comparisons.",
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society: Letters,
533
(1):
L70-L75
[10.1093/mnrasl/slae051]
[Journal Article/Letter]
2025.
"The Effect of Turbulence on the Angular Momentum of the Solar Wind.",
The Astrophysical Journal Letters,
985
(1):
L13
[10.3847/2041-8213/add325]
[Journal Article/Letter]
2025.
"Modeling Hot, Anisotropic Ion Beams in the Solar Wind Motivated by the Parker Solar Probe Observations near Perihelia.",
The Astrophysical Journal,
984
(2):
174
[10.3847/1538-4357/adc812]
[Journal Article/Letter]
