India's first Solar mission, Aditya-L1 is heading to its final destination, ISRO has done a situational awareness analysis of the location, the L1 point.

As on date, there are four spacecraft in the halo orbit of L1: NASA has WIND, Advanced Composition Explorer (ACE ) and Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVER), while the fourth, the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO), is a joint mission by NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA).

Lagrange points, also known as libration points, are unique locations in space where the gravitational force of two massive bodies (like Sun and Earth) precisely equals the centripetal force required for a small object (like spacecraft) to move with them, Isro said.

It added that this makes Lagrange points an excellent location for spacecrafts as orbit corrections and hence fuel requirements, needed to maintain the desired orbit, are kept at a minimum.

L1 is particularly significant because it is situated between the two primaries (the Sun and Earth), making it an ideal location for spacecrafts because they allow continuous observation of primary bodies, continuous communication with earth and an unobstructed view of celestial bodies.

These orbits are well-suited for scientific missions like Aditya which will act like a solar observatory around L1 and communicate to Earth.

Isro said various past missions have utilised the L1 point, including the International Sun-Earth Explorer (ISEE-3), the Genesis mission, ESA’s LISA Pathfinder, China's Chang’e 5 lunar orbiter, and NASA’s Gravity Recovery and Interior Recovery (GRAIL) mission, all of which have contributed to the understanding of space and ability to monitor space weather events.

And the operational spacecraft currently stationed there are also providing vital early warnings on adverse space weather events that help protect orbiting space assets and ground based infrastructure.