A photo of the COSPIN instrument
Click on image for full size
European Space Agency
COSPIN Instrument Page
COSPIN is one of the instruments on
the Ulysses spacecraft. COSPIN stands for the COsmic and Solar Particle INvestigation. Try saying that fast three times!
COSPIN is actually made up of 5
different sensors. These sensors are helping us make a map of the heliosphere. The Earth is inside the heliosphere, or the region of space influenced by the solar wind. Because the solar wind affects life on Earth, it is important that we understand the heliosphere and all of the particles in this region. COSPIN does just that!
The Ulysses probe was launched in 1990. It is still orbiting the Sun and sending data back to Earth. The builders of COSPIN knew that Ulysses would be in space a long time and so they made COSPIN really strong so that COSPIN would be able to survive a long time in space.
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