A space probe designed to make the closest pass ever of the sun will be built at Johns Hopkins University's Applied Physics Laboratory.
The university announced Thursday that NASA has selected the Laurel laboratory to design and build the spacecraft, which is scheduled to launch in 2015.
The probe is expected to fly by Venus, the second planet from the sun, seven times over nearly seven years to close in on the sun, eventually coming as close as 4.1 million miles.
The university says that would be within the orbit of Mercury, the closest planet to the sun, and about eight times closer than any spacecraft has come before.
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