PUNCH mission advances toward 2025 launch

On November 17, 2023, the Polarimeter to UNify the Corona and Heliosphere (PUNCH) mission achieved an important milestone, passing its internal system integration review and clearing the mission to start integrating its four observatories. Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) leads PUNCH, a NASA Small Explorer (SMEX) mission that will integrate understanding of the sun's corona, the outer atmosphere visible during total solar eclipses, with the "solar wind" that fills and defines the solar system. SwRI is also building the spacecraft and three of its five instruments.