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SDO | Solar Dynamics Observatory

SDO is designed to help us understand the Sun's influence on Earth and Near-Earth space by studying the solar atmosphere on small scales of space and time and in many wavelengths simultaneously.

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What Lies inside the Sun?

When a pond's surface is calm, you can see more clearly into its depths. As it turns out, the same is true for the sun. Researchers are excited that the sun's surface is calmer now than it's been in almost a century. It's a rare opportunity - the first since the Space Age began - to peer more clearly into the sun's mysterious interior. To take advantage of the opportunity, NASA is about to launch the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO). SDO is expected to launch this year, as early as November 2009.

Avalanche! The Incredible Data Stream of SDO

When NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) leaves Earth in November 2009 onboard an Atlas V rocket, the thunderous launch will trigger an avalanche. Mission planners are bracing themselves -- not for rocks or snow, but an avalanche of data. "SDO will beam back 150 million bits of data per second, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week," says Dean Pesnell of the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. That's almost 50 times more science data than any other mission in NASA history. "It's like downloading 500,000 iTunes a day." SDO is on a mission to study the sun in unprecedented detail. Onboard telescopes will scrutinize sunspots and solar flares using more pixels and colors than any other observatory in the history of solar physics. And SDO will reveal the sun's hidden secrets in a prodigious rush of pictures.

NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory Arrives at Kennedy Space Center

NASA's upcoming mission to study the sun in unprecedented detail and its effects on Earth, the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO), arrived at NASA's Kennedy Space Center, Fla. on July 9. The spacecraft left NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., on July 7, where it was built and tested. SDO will undergo final testing at Astrotech Space Operations, located near Kennedy Space Center, in preparation for its anticipated November launch. The SDO team will conduct of series of tests to be sure that the observatory arrived in good condition, as it is being readied for launch.