An innovative new mission will probe the mystery of how the Earth’s magnetosphere interacts with the solar wind. A new mission just launched to probe the interactions of the solar wind with our local space-weather environment, called the Solar wind Magnetosphere Ionosphere Link Explorer ( SMILE ). The mission, a partnership between the European Space Agency (ESA) and China’s Academy of Sciences (CAS), lifted off on a four-stage Vega-C rocket from the Guiana Space Center at 11:52 p.m. EDT on May 19th (3:52 UT May 19th). Controllers report that the solar panels have successfully deployed, and the spacecraft is in good health. ESA is tracking the mission via its New Norcia station in Australia , which is part of ESA's worldwide network of relays. SMILE is equipped with four instruments to make in situ measurements of the solar wind, the stream of charged particles and magnetic fields that are continuously flowing off the Sun.…