Project AstroSat: five years of operations and continuing

Abstract

India's first dedicated multi-wavelength satellite, AstroSat, was launched by PSLV C30 from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota, Andhra Pradesh on 28 September 2015. It is India's first multi-wavelength observatory. AstroSat carries five scientific payloads and is capable of simultaneous observations from ultraviolet to very hard X- rays. It has completed five years of on-board operations in September 2020 as a proposal-based observatory. Currently, it has close to 1500 global users and has resulted in more than 150 articles in peer-reviewed journals. This article is an overview providing a brief description of the AstroSat mission and some recent results using data from this unique Indian space observatory.