Mangalyaan

Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) orMangalyaan, the maiden interplanetarymission of ISRO, was launched in 2013by PSLV-C25.

ABOUT MOM

The scientific objectives are to exploreMars' surface features, morphology,mineralogy, and atmosphere.

MOM has followingfive payloads

o Mars Colour Camera (MCC)

o Thermal Infrared ImagingSpectrometer (TIS)

o Methane Sensor for Mars (MSM)

o Mars Exospheric Neutral CompositionAnalyser (MENCA)

o Lyman Alpha Photometer (LAP)

ACHIEVEMENTS OF MOM

In the past five years, the MOMorbiter helped India’s space agencyprepare a Martian Atlas based onthe images provided by the orbiter.

Phobos and Deimos, the twomoons of Mars, were also imagedfrom close distances by Mars ColourCamera (MCC).

The MOM is the only Martianartificial satellite that could imagethe full disc of Mars in one view frameand also image the far side of Deimos.

WHY IN NEWS?

An important conclusion of the mission has been the finding thatdust storms on the Martian can raise up to hundreds of

kilometres.

The Mangalyaan mission, which was initially meant tolast six months, completed five years of orbiting Marsrecently and is likely to continue for some more time.

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