Solar Orbiter artist view

The Solar Orbiter mission was approved in October 2000 by ESA's Science Programme Committee as a flexi-mission for launch in the 2008-2013 time-frame.
The sun’s atmosphere and the heliosphere are unique regions of space, where fundamental physical processes common to solar, astrophysical and laboratory plasmas can be studied in detail and under conditions impossible to reproduce on Earth. The results from Soho and Ulysses have enormously advanced our understanding of the solar corona, the associated solar wind and the 3-D heliosphere. However, we have reached the point where in situ measurements much closer into the sun, combined with high-resolution imaging and spectroscopy at high latitudes, promise to bring about major breakthroughs.