ISRO to launch historic XPoSat mission to study cosmic X-ray sources on Jan 1: When and where to watch live

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India’s first dedicated polarimetry mission to study various dynamics of bright astronomical X-ray sources in extreme conditions," the ISRO said. The PSLV-C58/EXPOSAT Mission will be launched at 9:10 am on Monday, January 1, 2024. The launch is planned from "the first launch-pad, SDSC-SHAR (SatishLive Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota), Sriharikota," ISRO said.

The ISRO said the launch can be viewed LIVE from 08:40 am on: 1. Youtube (Click here for link) 2. ISRO website (Click here for link) 3. ISRO's Facebook account (Click here for link) 4. DD National's account on X (Click here for link) XPoSat is the "first dedicated scientific satellite from the ISRO to carry out research in space-based polarisation measurements of X-ray emission from celestial sources (including black holes)", the space agency said.

The X-ray polarisation serves as a crucial diagnostic tool for examining the radiation mechanism and geometry of celestial sources. "The emission mechanism from various astronomical sources such as blackhole, neutron stars, active galactic nuclei, pulsar wind nebulae etc. originates from complex physical processes and are challenging to understand," the ISRO said.

One of the payloads on XpoSat, XSPECT, "would observe several types of sources viz X-ray pulsars, blackhole binaries, low-magnetic field neutron star (NS) in LMXBs, AGNs and Magnetars". Another payload POLIX "is expected to observe about 40 bright astronomical sources of different categories during the planned lifetime of XPoSat mission of about 5 years". The PSLV-C58 rocket, in its 60th mission, would carry primary payload XPoSat and 10 other satellites to be deployed in low earth orbits.