Yohkoh

Yohkoh
Type:	Space telescope
Country:	Japan
Operator:	ISAS
COSPAR-ID :	1991-062A
Mission dates
Dimensions:	420 kg
Size:	2 m × 2 m × 4 m
Begin:	August 30, 1991, 02:30 UTC
Starting place:	Kagoshima M1
Launcher:	Mu-3S-II
Status:	burned up on September 12, 2005
Orbit data
Rotation time :	97.4 min
Orbit inclination :	31.3 °
Apogee height :	754 km
Perigee height :	516 km

Yohkoh ( Japanese よ う こ う , Yōkō ; "sunbeam") was a space telescope for observing the sun .

The satellite was developed by the Japanese Institute of Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS) with US and British participation initially under the name SOLAR-A and launched on August 30, 1991 with a Mu rocket from the Kagoshima Space Center . The instruments were:

• A telescope for soft X-rays (0.5 to 2 k eV ).
• A telescope for hard X-rays (14 to 93 keV).
• A broadband X-ray and gamma spectrometer.
• A high resolution Bragg crystal spectrometer.

Yohkoh observed the sun for almost an entire sunspot cycle and took several million X-rays during this time. The mission ended with an attitude control problem on December 14, 2001, as a result of which the power supply batteries were depleted. The re-entry into the earth's atmosphere took place on September 12, 2005.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Yohkoh in Encyclopedia Astronautica , accessed April 20, 2012 (English).

Web links

Commons : Yohkoh  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Yohkoh website at ISAS (English)
• Yohkoh website at the University of Montana (English)