KARTHIKEYANMLP: India's Mars Orbiter's one month in the Mars orbit

The Indian Mars Orbiter entered the Mars orbit on 24 September, making India the first nation in the world to successfully launch a Mars mission in its maiden attempt.

With Mangalyaan's launch, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) became the fourth international space agency after National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) of the US, Russian Federal Space Agency (RFSA) and European Space Agency to undertake a mission to Mars.

It was also one of the cheapest Mars missions to have been undertaken so far as it cost only $74 million. Mangalyaan carried with it five scientific instruments which will be used to will study the Martian surface and its mineral composition and scan its atmosphere for methane gas.

Mangalyaan has five instruments aboard:

a camera,

two spectrometers,

a radiometer and

a photometer.

It aims to understand the process by which water was lost on Mars, measure methane levels in the Martian atmosphere, map the surface, composition and mineralogy of Mars and take images of the Martian surface.

None of the instruments will send back enough data to answer these questions definitively, but experts say the data will help them better understand how planets form, what conditions might make life possible and where else in the universe it might exist. Some of the data will complement research expected to be conducted by Maven.

Mission Facts

The 1,337 kg Mars Orbiter Satellite will be put into a 250 km X 23,500 km elliptical orbit.
The launch vehicle being used is a PSLV-C25.
This is the 25th mission of PSLV and fifth in the XL configuration.
Time from launch to injection of the Orbiter into its trajectory is about 40 minutes.
The cost of the mission is approximately Rs. 450 core.
With this mission, India will be the first Asian country and the fourth in the world to take part in interplanetary exploration.

The Mars Orbiter payloads

Lyman Alpha Photometer(LAP): This device is an absorption cell photometer that will help determine the relative abundance of Deuterium and Hydrogen from Lyman-Alpha emission in the upper Martian atmosphere. The results from the device will mainly help us understand the loss process of water from Mars, among other things.

Mars Color Camera(MCC): This tri-color camera will provide information regarding the Martian surface like surface features and composition. It will also help monitor the dynamic events and weather on the planet. The camera will also monitor Phobos, and Deimos, the two satellites of mars.

Methane Sensor for Mars(MSM): This device will measure Methane(CH4) in the planet’s atmosphere and map its sources.

Mars Exospheric neutral Composition Analyser(MENCA): This device is a mass spectrometer that can analyse neutral composition in the range of 1 to 300 amu with unit mass resolution.

Thermal Infrared Imaging Spectrometer(TIS): This device will measure the thermal emission both during day and night. TIS can also map surface composition and mineralogy of the planet.

Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) was launched 5 November, 2013, on board a polar rocket from the country's only spaceport at Sriharikota off the Bay of Bengal, about 80 km northeast of Chennai.