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Suzaku (formerly ASTRO-EII) is a Japanese X-ray astronomy satellite.
It was launched on 10 July 2005 aboard the M-V-6 rocket. The project was renamed Suzaku after its successful launch after the mythical Vermilion bird of the South.
Suzaku is carrying high spectroscopic resolution, very wide energy band instruments for detecting signals ranging from soft X-rays up to gamma-rays (0.3–600 keV). High resolution spectroscopy and wide-band are essential factors to physically investigate high energy astronomical phenomena, such as black holes and supernovae. One such feature, the broad iron K line, may be key to more direct imaging of black holes.
Just weeks after launch, on 29 July 2005 the first of series of cooling system malfunctions occurred, that ultimately on 8 August 2005 caused the entire reservoir of liquid helium to boil off into space. This effectively shut down the XRS which is the spacecraft's primary instrument. The two other instruments, XIS and HXD, were unaffected by the malfunction, and there are plans (Oct. 2013) to integrate another XRS into the proposed NeXT X-ray observation satellite planned for launch in 2014.
