The Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (or IRIS) is a planned space probe to observe the Sun by NASA

NASA

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is the agency of the United States government that is responsible for the nation's civilian space program and for aeronautics and aerospace research...

. It is a NASA Small Explorer program

Small Explorer program

The Small Explorer program is an effort within NASA to fund space exploration missions that cost no more than $120 million.- Program history :...

 mission to investigate the physical conditions of the solar limb, particularly the chromosphere

Chromosphere

The chromosphere is a thin layer of the Sun's atmosphere just above the photosphere, roughly 2,000 kilometers deep....

 of the Sun

Sun

The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is almost perfectly spherical and consists of hot plasma interwoven with magnetic fields...

. It will be built and operated by the Lockheed Martin

Lockheed Martin

Lockheed Martin is an American global aerospace, defense, security, and advanced technology company with worldwide interests. It was formed by the merger of Lockheed Corporation with Martin Marietta in March 1995. It is headquartered in Bethesda, Maryland, in the Washington Metropolitan Area....

 Solar and Astrophysics Laboratory, and launched in late 2012 by a Pegasus rocket

Pegasus rocket

The Pegasus rocket is a winged space launch vehicle capable of carrying small, unmanned payloads into low Earth orbit. It is air-launched, as part of an expendable launch system developed by Orbital Sciences Corporation . Three main stages burning solid propellant provide the thrust...

.

Its instrument is a high-frame-rate UV imaging spectrometer; one image a second, 0.3 arcsec spatial resolution, and sub-angstrom spectral resolution.

NASA announced on June 19, 2009 that the IRIS was selected from six small explorer mission candidates, along with Gravity and Extreme Magnetism SMEX

Gravity and Extreme Magnetism SMEX

The Gravity and Extreme Magnetism SMEX mission is a planned space observatory. The main scientific goal of GEMS is to be the first mission to systematically measure the polarization of cosmic X-Ray sources...

.

IRIS team

Science and engineering team members include:

• Lockheed Martin Solar and Astrophysics Lab
• Lockheed Martin Sensing and Exploration Systems
• Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
  Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
  The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory is a research institute of the Smithsonian Institution headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where it is joined with the Harvard College Observatory to form the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics .-History:The SAO was founded in 1890 by...
  
  
• Montana State University – Bozeman
• Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics, University of Oslo
  University of Oslo
  The University of Oslo , formerly The Royal Frederick University , is the oldest and largest university in Norway, situated in the Norwegian capital of Oslo. The university was founded in 1811 and was modelled after the recently established University of Berlin...
  
  
• High Altitude Observatory, NCAR
• Stanford University
  Stanford University
  The Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University or Stanford, is a private research university on an campus located near Palo Alto, California. It is situated in the northwestern Santa Clara Valley on the San Francisco Peninsula, approximately northwest of San...
  
  
• NASA Ames Research Center
  NASA Ames Research Center
  The Ames Research Center , is one of the United States of America's National Aeronautics and Space Administration 10 major field centers.The centre is located in Moffett Field in California's Silicon Valley, near the high-tech companies, entrepreneurial ventures, universities, and other...
  
  
• NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
• National Solar Observatory
  National Solar Observatory
  The mission of the National Solar Observatory is to advance knowledge of the Sun, both as an astronomical object and as the dominant external influence on Earth, by providing forefront observational opportunities to the research community...
  
  
• Space Sciences Lab, UC Berkeley
• Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory
  Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory
  Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory is a United States Department of Energy national laboratory for plasma physics and nuclear fusion science located on Princeton University's Forrestal Campus in Plainsboro Township, New Jersey. Its primary mission is research into and development of fusion as an...
  
  
• Sydney Institute for Astronomy, University of Sydney
• Center for Plasma Astrophysics, University of Leuven
• Mullard Space Science Laboratory
  Mullard Space Science Laboratory
  The UCL Mullard Space Science Laboratory is the United Kingdom's largest university space research group. MSSL is the Department of Space and Climate Physics of the University College London. UCL was one of the first universities in the world to conduct space research...
  
  
• Rutherford-Appleton Laboratory
• European Space Agency
  European Space Agency
  The European Space Agency , established in 1975, is an intergovernmental organisation dedicated to the exploration of space, currently with 18 member states...
  
  
• Max-Planck-Institut fuer Sonnensystemforschung
• National Astronomical Observatory, Tokyo
• Niels Bohr Institute
  Niels Bohr Institute
  The Niels Bohr Institute is a research institute of the University of Copenhagen. The research of the institute spans astronomy, geophysics, nanotechnology, particle physics, quantum mechanics and biophysics....
  
  , University of Copenhagen