Double Star TC-2

Double Star TC-2 was a Chinese satellite which was launched in July 2004, from Taiyuan, China, to study the Earth’s plasma environment from a polar orbit.

IRF contributed, together with Ireland and China, to the Neutral Atom Detector Unit (NUADU), designed to detect energetic neutral atoms which originate from the interaction of space plasma with the neutral gas surrounding our planet. This enabled us to visualize movement in the invisible plasma in the magnetosphere around the Earth.

More information at ESA