High Resolution Coronal Imager

The High Resolution Coronal Imager (Hi-C) is a sub-orbital telescope designed to take high-resolution images of the Sun's corona. It was launched on July 11, 2012 aboard a Black Brant sounding rocket from White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico. The images taken were the highest resolution photos ever of the Sun's corona. The High Resolution Coronal Imager (Hi-C) is a sub-orbital telescope designed to take high-resolution images of the Sun's corona. It was launched on July 11, 2012 aboard a Black Brant sounding rocket from White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico. The images taken were the highest resolution photos ever of the Sun's corona. The telescope weighs 464 pounds (210 kg), and is 10 feet (3.0 m) long. The mirrors are approximately 9.5 inches (24 cm) across. Its optics were designed at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama with assistance from the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory and L-3Com/Tinsley Laboratories of Richmond, California. Dr. Jonathan Cirtain, from MSFL said: 'These mirrors were to be the finest pieces of glass ever fabricated for solar astrophysics.' The imaging system was designed by Apogee Imaging Systems with a resolution of 0.1 arcsec/pixel (14 times higher resolution than the Solar Dynamics Observatory). It was based on a customized version of the E2V CCD203 from Lockheed Martin, which is a very large 4 channel back illuminated 4,000 × 4,000 pixel charge-coupled device (CCD). The flight lasted for 10 minutes, reached an altitude of 283 kilometres (176 mi) and the telescope captured 165 images of a large active region. It imaged the Sun in ultraviolet light at 19.3 nm wavelength. The total cost of the mission was $5 million. The experiment revealed never-before-seen 'magnetic braids' of plasma roiling in the Sun's outer layers. It was the first time scientists were able to directly observe magnetic reconnection in braids, which may be the primary sources of heating in the active solar corona.