![]() A BAE systems technician inspecting the fully assembled Carruthers Geocorona Observatory | |
Mission type | Space weather |
---|---|
Operator | NASA |
Start of mission | |
Launch date | 23 September 2025 (planned) |
Rocket | Falcon 9 Block 5 |
Launch site | Kennedy, LC-39A |
Contractor | SpaceX |
Orbital parameters | |
Reference system | Geocentric orbit |
Regime | L1 |
The Carruthers Geocorona Observatory, previously called Global Lyman-alpha Imagers of the Dynamic Exosphere (GLIDE) is a NASA mission led by the University of Illinois, which will survey ultraviolet light emitted by Earth's outermost atmospheric layer, the exosphere. [1] [2]
The mission name was given to honour Dr. George R. Carruthers, a pioneer American space physicist, engineer and investor. He is widely recognised for his groundbreaking contributions to ultraviolet astronomy. His most famous invention was the Far Ultraviolet Camera/Spectrograph, [3] a compact but powerful telescope that was placed by the astronauts of Apollo 16 on the Moon in 1972. [4]
Carruthers Geocorona Observatory is planned to be launched as a secondary payload on the SpaceX Falcon 9 launch vehicle carrying NASA's Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe (IMAP) spacecraft. [5] [6] As of December 2024, the launch is scheduled for no earlier than September 2025.