TESIS experiment on EUV imaging spectroscopy of the Sun

TESIS is a set of solar imaging instruments in development by the Lebedev Physical Institute of the Russian Academy of Science, to be launched aboard the Russian spacecraft CORONAS-PHOTON in December 2008. The main goal of TESIS is to provide complex observations of solar active phenomena from the transition region to the inner and outer solar corona with high spatial, spectral and temporal resolution in the EUV and Soft X-ray spectral bands. TESIS includes five unique space instruments: the MgXII Imaging Spectroheliometer (MISH) with spherical bent crystal mirror, for observations of the Sun in the monochromatic MgXII 8.42 Å line; the EUV Spectoheliometer (EUSH) with grazing incidence difraction grating, for the registration of the full solar disc in monochromatic lines of the spectral band 280-330 Å; two Full-disk EUV Telescopes (FET) with multilayer mirrors covering the band 130-136 and 290-320 Å; and the Solar EUV Coronagraph (SEC), based on the Ritchey-Chretien scheme, to observe the inner and outer solar corona from 0.2 to 4 solar radii in spectral band 290-320 Å. TESIS experiment will start at the rising phase of the 24th cycle of solar activity. With the advanced capabilities of its instruments, TESIS will help better understand the physics of solar flares and high-energy phenomena and provide new data on parameters of solar plasma in the temperature range 105-107K. This paper gives a brief description of the experiment, its equipment, and its scientific objectives.