According to ISRO's spaceport director M.Y.S. Prasad, two of the three phases of the Mars mission have been accomplished, with the launching of its Orbiter Nov 5 in the earth orbit and injecting it in the trans Mars orbit.
"The third important phase will be capturing of Mars orbit in September 2014, at about 500 km from the red planet's surface, for the five scientific experiments," Prasad told IANS on phone from Sriharikota, where the spaceport is located, about 80 km northeast of Chennai.
The space agency's Indian Deep Space Network at Bylalu, about 40km away from Bangalore, will carry out a mid-course correction Dec 11 to ensure the Orbiter stays on course in the solar orbit.
"Three more mid-course corrections will be conducted in April, August and September 2014 during the Orbiter's voyage in the solar orbit to the Martian orbit, about 500km from the red planet's surface," Karnik said.
After a nine-month long journey, the spacecraft will enter in mid-September the Mars sphere of influence, which is around 573,473km from its surface, in a hyperbolic trajectory.
"When the spacecraft is closest to Mars in mid-September, it will be captured into the Martian orbit through a crucial manoeuvre," Karnic said.
Transition from the earth's final orbit to solar orbit was programmed in line with sun's gravity and laws of the universe to ensure Orbiter reaches precisely on time to sling into the Martian orbit in mid-September.
The Orbiter is carrying onboard five scientific instruments -- Mars Colour Camera, Methane Sensor, Thermal Infrared Imaging Spectrometer, Lyman Alpha Photometer, and Mars Exospheric Natural Composition Analyser.
As the fourth planet from sun and behind earth, Mars is the second smallest celestial body in the solar system. Named after Roman god of war, it is also known as red planet due to the presence of iron oxide in abundance.
Though earth and Mars have equal period of revolution around their axis, the red planet takes 24 hours and 37 minutes to complete a revolution. Earth takes around 365 days to orbit the sun and Mars 687 days.
