Dr. Ramya Anche leads NASA PUFFINS interstellar dust mission
Big news for space fans: Dr. Ramya Anche, who grew up in Devanahalli, near Bengaluru, is leading NASA's new PUFFINS mission.
With a $20 million budget and a 2030 launch date, this project will use a 10-inch telescope to study ultraviolet light from about 70 distant stars, helping scientists figure out how cosmic dust shapes the universe and how stars are born.
Team of 40 revives UV spectropolarimetry
PUFFINS brings together about 40 people from top places like the University of Arizona and McDonald Observatory, plus Indian institutes like IUCAA and IIA.
The team will use UV spectropolarimetry, a technique that hasn't flown in space for 30 years, to dig deeper into interstellar dust.
As Dr. Anche puts it, "The data it returns will fill a long-standing gap in our understanding of interstellar dust and, by extension, the structure and evolution of the universe."