{"id":20580,"date":"2024-02-17T08:36:42","date_gmt":"2024-02-17T03:06:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=20580"},"modified":"2025-04-06T02:16:08","modified_gmt":"2025-04-05T20:46:08","slug":"sofia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/sofia\/","title":{"rendered":"What is SOFIA (Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy)?"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>About SOFIA (Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy)<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>SOFIA was a\u00a0telescope mounted on a Boeing 747 SP aircraft that\u00a0studied infrared light, essentially heat, emitted by objects in the universe.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>SOFIA is\u00a0operated jointly by NASA and the\u00a0German space agency.<\/li>\n<li>It is the\u00a0world&#8217;s largest airborne astronomical observatory, complementing NASA\u2019s space telescopes as well as major Earth-based telescopes.<\/li>\n<li>The observatory, fitted with a\u00a08.9-foot-wide (2.7 meter) telescope with a nearly 20-ton mirror, used a door in the side of the aircraft to peer at the sky.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>Flying into the stratosphere at 38,000-45,000 feet put SOFIA\u00a0above 99 percent of Earth\u2019s infrared-blocking atmosphere, allowing astronomers to study the solar system and beyond in ways that are not possible with ground-based telescopes.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>SOFIA could\u00a0observe the universe in the widest range of infrared light.<\/li>\n<li>The airplane is capable of ten-hour flights, with\u00a0flight paths chosen to keep ahead of the sunrise and maximize the amount of darkness.<\/li>\n<li>The observatory\u2019s mobility allowed researchers to observe from almost anywhere in the world, and\u00a0enabled studies of transient events that often take place over oceans, where there are no telescopes.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>For example, astronomers on SOFIA studied eclipse-like events of Pluto, Saturn\u2019s moon Titan, and Kuiper Belt Object MU69, the next flyby target for NASA\u2019s New Horizons spacecraft, to study the objects\u2019 atmospheres and surroundings.<\/li>\n<li>The SOFIA\u00a0project was prematurely ended in 2022 after operating for 12 years.\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<h3>Q1) What is an Asteroid?<\/h3>\n<p>Asteroids are small, rocky objects that orbit the sun. Although asteroids orbit the sun like planets, they are much smaller than planets. They are leftovers from the formation of our solar system. From being as small as 10 meters across to as huge as 530 km in diameter, asteroids have varied sizes<\/p>\n<p><strong>Source:<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.livescience.com\/space\/asteroids\/water-detected-on-the-surface-of-an-asteroid-for-the-1st-time-ever\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><u>Water detected on the surface of an asteroid for the 1st time ever<\/u><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>SOFIA was a telescope mounted on a Boeing 747 SP aircraft that studied infrared light, essentially heat, emitted by objects in the universe. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":20581,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-20580","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","8":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20580","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20580"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20580\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20581"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20580"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20580"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20580"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}