In a first, ESA’s Proba-3 space-based coronagraph tracks space weather back to its source.

It has been a dream of astronomers and solar scientists for ages. A new mission gives solar researchers a powerful new tool in their arsenal: on-demand, total solar eclipses. Launched in 2024 , The European Space Agency’s Proba-3 mission has proven the feasibility of a free-flying, space-based coronagraph. Now, first science results from the mission are giving us a view of the origin of space weather. The results were recently published in *The Astrophysical Journal Letters*.

The mission works with two spacecraft flying in formation: the Occulter spacecraft which physically blocks out the Sun, and the Coronagraph, which observes the eclipse and the solar corona. The two spacecraft follow a looping, highly elliptical orbit around the Earth in a 19.7 hour period.…