India Launches X-Ray Satellite To Study Black Holes

India on Monday (January 1) successfully launched its maiden X-Ray Polarimeter satellite, which will offer several insights into celestial objects like black holes, becoming the second country after the United States to acquire the capability.

Indian Space Research Organization's 44.4-metre tall Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) carrying the satellite lifted off from a space port in Sriharikota in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh at 9:10am and successfully injected the primary X-Ray Polarimeter satellite XPoSat into a 650km low earth orbit, the national space agency said on X, formerly Twitter.

The launch of the rocket capped a 25-hour countdown and was greeted with a thunderous applause from spectators who gathered in large numbers at the spaceport situated about 135km east of Chennai.

ISRO's satellite launch on the first day of 2024 comes a few months after the space agency successfully landed an unmanned mission on the moon and launched a separate mission to study the sun.

According to ISRO, the XPoSat will investigate the polarisation of intense X-ray sources in space. It is the first dedicated scientific satellite from the space agency to carry out research in space-based polarisation measurements of X-ray emission from celestial sources.

The X-Ray polarisation serves as a crucial diagnostic tool for examining the radiation mechanism and geometry of celestial sources.