.png)
Two spacecraft have accomplished a remarkable feat: replicating a total solar eclipse in orbit. On June 16, the European Space Agency's (ESA) Proba-3 mission revealed the first photographs from a successful test in which one satellite obscured the sun's light, allowing the other to record the dazzling outer atmosphere, known as the corona. Unlike Earth's transitory eclipses, this manufactured counterpart allows for long-term, repeated monitoring. "We could see the corona without any special image processing," explained Andrei Zhukov of the Royal Observatory of Belgium. "It was just visible there, like during a natural total solar eclipse."
ESA's Proba-3 spacecraft recreates eclipses to study the sun's million-degree corona in unprecedented detail
According to ESA sources, the Proba-3 spacecraft circles Earth in an elliptical route of up to 60,000 kilometers at the far end. During alignment, the satellites float only 150 meters apart, throwing precise shadows on each other. Scientists can detect the sun's faint, million-degree corona during total eclipses, which is 200 times hotter than the visible surface. Scientists believe the intermediate layer holds clues to why the outer region is so heated.
So far, the twin satellites have conducted nine test eclipses, with the intention of completing two each week. Proba-3 has the ability to mimic natural eclipses every 20 hours for up to six hours, when they typically last only a few minutes every 18 months or so. This feature allows scientists to study the dynamic and magnetic activity of the solar corona.
Proba-3 was launched into orbit from India on December 5. The satellite is expected to capture up to 1,000 hours of eclipse data over the following two years. This finding not only allows for systematic observation of solar activity, but also improves solar weather forecasting for satellites and electrical networks.
ESA officials see this as a new era in heliophysics, with man-made eclipses filling the observational vacuum left by the scarcity of total solar eclipses on Earth. With each orbit and eclipse, astronomers get closer to unraveling the long-standing mysteries of our star's fiery corona.
