Satellite Location · Entry V

The Sun

Heliocentric Map

Heliocentric ecliptic J2000 frame, units = AU. Inner planets, four active heliocentric orbiters (Parker, Solar Orbiter, STEREO-A, BepiColombo), five platforms in halo orbits around L1, three at L2, and the five outbound spacecraft (Voyagers, Pioneers, New Horizons) shown as direction arrows extending to their current heliocentric distances.

Planet elements: VSOP87 / JPL DE441 mean elements · Spacecraft orbits: mission status pages, JPL Horizons · L1 / L2 distances: CR3BP linearization with Earth at 1 AU · Halo orbits: representative Lissajous parameterization in Sun-Earth rotating frame
4
Heliocentric Orbiters
8
At L1
3
At L2
5
Outbound
4
Historical
4
Inner Planets

The Sun "satellite location" page has a very different shape from a planetary one. Most of what astronomers call a solar mission isn't in solar orbit — Hinode, IRIS, SDO are all in Earth orbit and live on the Earth page. What's actually heliocentric is a smaller, weirder set: Parker on its 88-day plunge to within 9.86 R☉, Solar Orbiter climbing out of the ecliptic, STEREO-A drifting ahead of Earth on an inner-Earth orbit, BepiColombo on final approach to Mercury. Then there are the Lagrange platforms — SOHO, ACE, DSCOVR, Wind, Aditya-L1 in halo orbits around Sun-Earth L1; JWST, Euclid, Spektr-RG at L2. These are formally in heliocentric orbit but track Earth at all times. And finally there are the five outbound spacecraft — Voyager 1 & 2 past the heliopause, Pioneer 10 & 11 silent for decades but still on escape trajectories, New Horizons heading toward the heliosheath. The four camera presets are built around these four very different scales: Sun close-up (Parker perihelion), Inner system (1.5 AU), Earth & Lagrange (5 Mkm), and Outer trajectories (200 AU).

RAVEN Satellite Location · Sun

Heliocentric Ecliptic · J2000 Frame

Sun at origin. Units = AU. Lagrange platforms collapse to dots at heliocentric scale — switch to the Earth & Lagrange preset to resolve their halo orbits.

Layers

Sun · Wavelength

Clock

UTC—
JD (TDB)—
Earth heliocentric λ—
Parker perihelion countdown—
Time accel.×86k
Inner planets sweep their orbits in 88 d (Mercury) → 687 d (Mars). Parker's perihelia come every 88 days. The five outbound arrows are drawn at their JPL Horizons distances for 2026-08-20 and are static — they do not advance with the clock. (Voyager 1 recedes at ~3.6 AU/yr.)

Camera Presets

simulated — · published mean elements + Lissajous halo parameterization
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Catalog

Every body above with the orbital element set the visualization is propagated from. Click a card to fly the camera to that body.

Inner Planets 4

Heliocentric Orbiters 4 active

Sun-Earth L1 Platforms 5

Sun-Earth L2 Platforms 3

Outbound (Heliocentric Escape) 5

Historical / Decommissioned 4

How the Positions Are Computed

Frame

Heliocentric ecliptic J2000. Units = AU throughout (1 AU = 149 597 870.7 km). +X toward vernal equinox, +Z = ecliptic north pole, +Y completes the right-handed system. µ☉ = 4π² AU³ / yr² by definition; Kepler's third law gives T(yr) = a(AU)^1.5 for two-body solar orbits.

Planets

Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars are propagated as Keplerian ellipses from VSOP87 / DE441 mean elements at J2000. For visual fidelity the planet markers are dramatically oversized (Earth at true radius is 4.3 × 10⁻⁵ AU — invisible at any scale where Mars orbit is also visible). Markers are not to scale; planet orbits are.

Heliocentric orbiters

Parker, Solar Orbiter, STEREO-A and BepiColombo are each in a single Kepler ellipse around the Sun. Parker's orbit is the post-VGA-7 configuration (perihelion 0.046 AU = 9.86 R☉, aphelion 0.73 AU, period 88 d). Solar Orbiter is its 2026-era post-VGA orbit (perihelion 0.293 AU, inclination 24°). STEREO-A is its Earth-leading heliocentric orbit (a = 0.961 AU, period 344 d). BepiColombo is a representative cruise ellipse — its actual transfer trajectory is many-flyby and would require Horizons interpolation for accurate phase. Mercury orbit insertion is November 2026.

Lagrange points and halo orbits

Sun-Earth L1 sits 0.01001 AU sunward of Earth (1.496 × 10⁶ km); L2 sits 0.01007 AU anti-sunward (1.507 × 10⁶ km). Both are computed each frame from Earth's instantaneous heliocentric position. Lagrange platforms are placed on Lissajous halo orbits in the Sun-Earth rotating frame, with amplitudes (Ax, Ay, Az) and period (~180 d) tabulated per platform from published mission halo parameters. The rotating-frame halo position is then rotated by Earth's heliocentric longitude back into the inertial frame. The resulting motion in the inertial frame is the halo orbit you see at the Earth & Lagrange preset.

Outbound spacecraft

Voyager 1, Voyager 2, Pioneer 10, Pioneer 11 and New Horizons are well outside the inner solar system and on essentially straight-line escape trajectories at this scale. Each is rendered as a direction vector from the Sun out to the current published heliocentric distance, in J2000 ecliptic coordinates derived from the published spacecraft pointing (RA / Dec / heliocentric distance from JPL Horizons). They appear as arrow tips at the edge of the inner-system view; toggle the Outer preset to see them at true distance.

References

  1. Standish, E. M. & Williams, J. G. — JPL Approximate Positions of the Planets (mean elements derived from DE441)
  2. Bretagnon, P. & Francou, G. 1988 — VSOP87 planetary theory, A&A 202
  3. Fox, N. J. et al. 2016 — Parker Solar Probe mission and science, Space Sci. Rev. 204
  4. Müller, D. et al. 2020 — Solar Orbiter mission, A&A 642
  5. Kaiser, M. L. et al. 2008 — STEREO mission overview, Space Sci. Rev. 136
  6. Benkhoff, J. et al. 2021 — BepiColombo mission overview, Space Sci. Rev. 217
  7. Domingo, V. et al. 1995 — SOHO mission overview, Sol. Phys. 162
  8. Stone, E. C. et al. 1998 — ACE mission overview, Space Sci. Rev. 86
  9. Marshak, A. et al. 2018 — DSCOVR mission and EPIC observations, BAMS 99
  10. Tripathi, D. et al. 2023 — Aditya-L1 mission overview, J. Astrophys. Astron. 44
  11. Gardner, J. P. et al. 2023 — JWST L2 orbit and operations, PASP 135
  12. Laureijs, R. et al. 2011 — Euclid definition study, arXiv 1110.3193
  13. Predehl, P. et al. 2021 — eROSITA / Spektr-RG mission, A&A 647
  14. Stone, E. C. et al. 2013 — Voyager 1 heliopause crossing, Science 341
  15. Stern, S. A. et al. 2018 — New Horizons after Pluto, Science 359
  16. Farquhar, R. W. & Dunham, D. W. 1981 — Libration-point halo orbits and station-keeping (the original halo-orbit method paper for SOHO-class missions)
  17. Howell, K. C. 1984 — Three-dimensional periodic halo orbits, Cel. Mech. 32
  18. JPL Horizons — canonical ephemerides for all spacecraft + Voyager / Pioneer / New Horizons heliocentric distance

Fifth entry in the RAVEN Satellite Location series · v1 · 2026-05-13