NASA invites people to submit names to go onboard its new solar mission
Washington: NASA is inviting people around the world to submit their names online to be placed on a microchip aboard NASAs historic Parker Solar Probe mission, to be launched this summer.
The mission will travel through the Sun's atmosphere, facing brutal heat and radiation conditions -- and your name will go along for the ride. The submissions of names will be accepted until April 27, the US space agency said in a statement on Thursday.
"This probe will journey to a region humanity has never explored before. This mission will answer questions scientists have sought to uncover for more than six decades," said Thomas Zurbuchen, Associate Administrator for Science Mission Directorate at NASA.
The spacecraft -- about the size of a small car -- will travel directly into the Sun's atmosphere about four million miles from the star's surface.
The primary goals for the mission are to trace how energy and heat move through the solar corona and to explore what accelerates the solar wind as well as solar energetic particles.
To perform the investigations, the spacecraft and instruments will be protected from the Sun's heat by a 4.5-inch-thick carbon-composite shield.
The state-of-the-art heat shield will keep the four instrument suites designed to study magnetic fields, plasma and energetic particles, and image the solar wind at room temperature.
In May 2017, NASA renamed the spacecraft from the Solar Probe Plus to the Parker Solar Probe in honour of astrophysicist Eugene Parker.
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Lt Gen NS Raja Subramani to be India's next Chief of Defence Staff
New Delhi (PTI): Lt Gen NS Raja Subramani will be India's new Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) and his key task is set to be to implement the ambitious theaterisation plan that seeks to ensure tri-services synergy.
He will succeed Gen Anil Chauhan whose tenure will come to an end on May 30.
Gen Chauhan, a former Eastern Army Commander, took charge as the country's senior-most military commander in September 2022, over nine months after the first CDS, General Bipin Rawat, died in a helicopter crash in Tamil Nadu.
The government has appointed Lt Gen NS Raja Subramani (Retd) as the Chief of Defence Staff, who will also function as the secretary of the Department of Military Affairs, the defence ministry said on Saturday.
Lt Gen Subramani is currently serving as the military adviser to the National Security Council Secretariat.
Prior to that, he was the Vice Chief of the Army Staff from July 1, 2024 to July 31, 2025, and was General Officer Commanding-in-Chief of the Central Command from March 2023 till June 2024.
As Chief of Defence Staff, Lt Gen Subramani's primary task will be to implement the theaterisation model to bring in tri-services synergy by rolling out integrated military commands.
The officer is a graduate of the National Defence Academy and the Indian Military Academy. He was commissioned into the eighth battalion of the Garhwal Rifles on December 14, 1985.
Lt Gen Subramani is an alumnus of Joint Services Command Staff College, Bracknell (UK), and the National Defence College, New Delhi. He holds a Master of Arts degree from King's College London and an MPhil in defence studies from Madras University.
In his illustrious career spanning over 40 years, Lt Gen Subramani has served across a wide spectrum of conflict and terrain profiles and tenanted a host of Command, Staff and Instructional appointments.
He commanded the 16 Garhwal Rifles in Counter-Insurgency operations in Assam as part of Operation Rhino, the 168 Infantry Brigade in Jammu and Kashmir, and the 17 Mountain Division in the Central Sector, all during a challenging operational environment.
He also has the distinction of commanding two Corps, including the Indian Army's premier strike Corps on the Western Front.
