Into space discoveries: a device for hunting for solar flares will be placed on the ISS

One of the tasks of the Russian ISS crew's spacewalk on May 27 will be the installation of the Sun-Terahertz instrument, designed to study processes in the Sun and predict space weather. At the same time, as experts interviewed by Izvestia note, the greatest efficiency of the device is achieved in conjunction with ground installations. The crew will also replace the world's first samples of ultrapure semiconductors grown in space. In the future, this technology will make it possible to create a new generation of electronics. In addition, the researchers will remove containers with organisms that have spent almost five years in outer space. For more information about the experiments, see the Izvestia article.

The ISS will study the atmosphere of the Sun

Scientists will monitor space weather from the ISS. For this purpose, the equipment of the Sun—Terahertz experiment, which was delivered to the ISS by the Progress MS-33 cargo ship in March, will be placed on its outer skin.

The installation of the equipment will be performed by cosmonauts Sergey Kud-Sverchkov and Sergey Mikaev. The spacewalk is scheduled for May 27 at 17:15 Moscow time, it will last about five hours. Andrey Fedyaev will provide them with support from the station.

As explained in Roscosmos, the radio telescope was developed at the Lebedev Physics Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The experiment is aimed at studying the Sun in the terahertz range. The research will allow us to look into the previously inaccessible layers of the star's atmosphere. This is important for predicting flares and coronal mass ejections that determine space weather.

— The device turns on automatically and works continuously. Its optics perform integral measurements of the entire solar disk. In this case, changing the signal of a relatively calm Sun is of key importance. Thanks to this, the data can be adjusted to take into account the background radiation level, which makes it possible to reliably record flashes and active events," Olga Krivolapova, curator of the experiment, chief system design specialist at RSC Energia, told Izvestia.

According to her, the development of the equipment has been carried out for more than ten years. The experiment itself is designed for two to three years and is primarily aimed at testing hypotheses about solar flares in the terahertz range. The data obtained will allow for a deeper study of the processes occurring on the Sun, and in the future may form the basis of systems for regular monitoring of solar activity.

— One of the tasks in solar physics is to understand how active processes develop in the solar atmosphere. The basic principle of such studies is that the higher the frequency, the deeper you can "look" inside the star. However, on Earth, high-frequency bands are absorbed by atmospheric water vapor. Ways to solve the problem are to place devices in orbit (like the "Sun—Terahertz") or on our planet, where the air is drier. The area of Hulugaisha Peak in Buryatia is one of the sites where the ideal astroclimate for terahertz measurements is. A cosmic ray station has been operating here for many years," said Yuri Yasyukevich, Deputy Director for Research at the Institute of Solar—Terrestrial Physics of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

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He added that the "Sun-Terahertz" project, as the expert noted, can be supplemented with data from the ground-based scientific infrastructure. In particular, we are talking about the Siberian Radioheliograph, a megascience—class installation of the National Heliogeophysical Complex of the Russian Academy of Sciences, as well as the RATAN-600 radio telescope located in the Caucasus. Comparing data from various instruments will allow us to reconstruct the three-dimensional structure of processes in the solar atmosphere, from the lower layers to the upper ones. This, in turn, will create the basis for developing more reliable indicators and forecasting solar flares.

Crystals for microelectronics will be grown in space

The next task of the exit, Roscosmos said, will be to continue the Ekran-M experiment. It aims to grow semiconductors based on gallium arsenide in space, a material needed to create solar panels, laser installations and LEDs. The equipment for the project was developed at the A.V. Rzhanov Institute of Semiconductor Physics of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences by order of RSC Energia.

The experiment is designed to take advantage of the vacuum of space. At the moment, this is the only such research program in the world. During the experiment, scientists want to confirm the possibility of producing semiconductors in space for further replication of this work.

— New data on manned space exploration suggests that the creation of pure semiconductor films in space by the method of molecular beam epitaxy is a promising and commercially demanded direction in the future. As engineers, we see that this is an exceptional project for technology, science, and the further development of production in orbit," explained Dmitry Surin, Deputy Head of the RSC Energia Scientific and Technical Center.

At the first stage of the project, the technology of film synthesis in orbit will be tested. In the future, experts believe, the experiment should be continued at the new Russian Space Station (ROS).

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Microbes will help to make interplanetary flights

Also, as part of the extravehicular activity session, the astronauts will have to move to the small research module "Poisk", where they will need to take a container with samples to the station, which are displayed on the outer surface of the ISS as part of the Biorisk experiment, the state corporation reported.

The essence of the project is to study the issues of planetary quarantine and planetary protection. In addition, the experiment is intended to provide an answer to whether it is possible for living organisms to be tolerated in outer space and whether such a transfer could pose a threat to Earth. The experiment has been going on for more than 20 years. As part of the research, containers with various biological objects were placed on the outer surface of the station. As a result, scientists have obtained a significant amount of data on organisms capable of surviving in open space.

— The main task is to study the limits of survival of a wide range of organisms in outer space, as well as to study the changes that occur in different species at the physiological, biochemical and molecular genetic levels. The answers to these questions will help to increase our knowledge about the possibility of spreading life in the Solar System," said Sergey Kharin, a leading researcher at the Laboratory of Environmental Microbiology and Antimicrobial Protection at the Institute of Biomedical Problems of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

In total, according to the expert, three Biorisk containers were placed on the ISS. Now experts on Earth are studying objects from the second one. The exhibition of the samples lasted two years and eight months. As noted, most of the microorganisms, fungi, lichens and seeds survived, while their viability practically did not differ from the terrestrial control samples.

According to Sergey Kharin, the bacteria that previously lived directly on board the ISS turned out to be the most resistant. Scientists pay special attention to their ability to repair DNA breaks, which is important for developing mechanisms for long-term survival in space conditions. The exhibition of samples from the last container is currently being completed, and this stage has become the longest — four years and eight months.