Cidersomerset
12th September 2013, 21:04
Whether we have been flying out among the stars as many of us
on here speculate with the secret space programme, or not.
This is an achievement ............
BREAKING: NASA Confirms Voyager 1 Probe Has Left the Solar System
6eaPoB7l3OU
====================================================
http://static.bbci.co.uk/frameworks/barlesque/2.48.3/desktop/3.5/img/blq-blocks_grey_alpha.png
12 September 2013 Last updated at 19:00
Voyager probe 'leaves Solar System'By Jonathan Amos
Science correspondent, BBC News
http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/66509000/jpg/_66509267_r2620085-voyager_spacecraft-spl.jpg
Voyager artist impression Voyager will live out its days circling the centre of our Milky Way Galaxy
The Voyager-1 spacecraft has become the first manmade object to leave the Solar
System.Scientists say the probe's instruments indicate it has moved beyond the bubble
of hot gas from our Sun and is now moving in the space between the stars.Launched in
1977, Voyager was sent initially to study the outer planets, but then just kept on going.
Today, the veteran Nasa mission is almost 19 billion km (12 billion miles) from home.
This distance is so vast that it takes 17 hours now for a radio signal sent from Voyager
to reach receivers here on Earth.
"This is really a key milestone that we'd been hoping we would reach when we started
this project over 40 years ago - that we would get a spacecraft into interstellar space,"
said Prof Ed Stone, the chief scientist on the venture.
"Scientifically it's a major milestone, but also historically - this is one of those journeys
of exploration like circumnavigating the globe for the first time or having a footprint on
the Moon for the first time. This is the first time we've begun to explore the space
between the stars," he told BBC News. Sensors on Voyager had been indicating for
some time that its local environment had changed. The data that finally convinced the
mission team to call the jump to interstellar space came from the probe's Plasma Wave
Science (PWS) instrument. This can measure the density of charged particles in
Voyager's vicinity.
Readings taken in April/May this year and October/November last year revealed a near-
100-fold jump in the number of protons occupying every cubic metre of space.
Mission chief scientist Professor Ed Stone: "We got there!"
Scientists have long theorised such a spike would eventually be observed if Voyager
could get beyond the influence of the magnetic fields and particle wind that billow from
the surface of the Sun.
When the Voyager team put the new data together with information from the other
instruments onboard, they calculated the moment of escape to have occurred on or
about 25 August, 2012. This conclusion is contained in a report published by the journal
Science.
"This is big; it's really impressive - the first human-made object to make it out into
interstellar space," said Prof Don Gurnett from the University of Iowa and the principal
investigator on the PWS. On 25 August, 2012, Voyager-1 was some 121 Astronomical
Units away. That is, 121 times the separation between the Earth and the Sun.
Breaching the boundary, known technically as the heliopause, was, said the English
Astronomer Royal, Prof Sir Martin Rees, a remarkable achievement: "It's utterly
astonishing that this fragile artefact, based on 1970s technology, can signal its presence
from this immense distance."
Although now embedded in the gas, dust and magnetic fields from other stars, Voyager
still feels a gravitational tug from the Sun, just as some comets do that lie even further
out in space. But to all intents and purposes, it has left what most people would define
as the Solar System. It is now in a completely new domain.
Voyager-1 departed Earth on 5 September 1977, a few days after its sister spacecraft, Voyager-2.
The pair's primary objective was to survey the planets Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and
Neptune - a task they completed in 1989.
They were then steered towards deep space. It is expected that their plutonium power
sources will stop supplying electricity in about 10 years, at which point their instruments
and their 20W transmitters will die.
Voyager-1 will not approach another star for nearly 40,000 years, even though it is
moving at 45km/s (100,000mph).
"Voyager-1 will be in orbit around the centre of our galaxy with all its stars for billions of
years," said Prof Stone.
http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/69809000/jpg/_69809416_dot.jpg
Pale Blue Dot In 1990, Voyager-1 looked back and took a picture of Earth - a "pale blue dot"
The probe's work is not quite done, however. For as long as they have working
instruments, scientists will want to sample the new environment.The new region
through which Voyager is now flying was generated and sculpted by big stars that
exploded millions of years ago.There is indirect evidence and models to describe the
conditions in this medium, but Voyager can now measure them for real and report back.
The renowned British planetary scientist Prof Fred Taylor commented: "As a young post-
doc, I went to [Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory] and worked for a while with the team
that was doing the science definition study for the Outer Planets Grand Tour, which later
became Voyager.
"It seemed so incredible and exciting to think we would see and explore Jupiter and
Saturn close up, let alone Uranus and Neptune.
"The idea that the spacecraft would then exit the Solar System altogether was so way
out, figuratively as well as literally, that we didn't even discuss it then, although I
suppose we knew it would happen someday. Forty-three years later, that day has
arrived, and Voyager is still finding new frontiers."
http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/69806000/jpg/_69806156_2a196dfb-fba1-4851-8c8d-22945bd1e250.jpg
Schematic of the Solar System The Sun sits in an extensive bubble of hot gas called the
heliosphere
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-24026153
======================================================
Cosmic Journeys : Voyager Journey to the Stars
seXbrauRTY4
Published on 6 Apr 2013
Cosmic Journeys examines the great promise of the Voyager mission and where it will
lead us in our grand ambition to move out beyond our home planet. The two Voyager
spacecraft are part of an ancient quest to push beyond our boundaries... to see what
lies beyond the horizon. Now tens of billions of kilometers from Earth, two spacecraft
are streaking out into the void. What will we learn about the Galaxy, the Universe, and
ourselves from Voyager's epic Journey to the stars?
December 19, 1972... the splashdown of the Apollo 17 crew capsule marked the end of
the golden age of manned spaceflight. The Mercury.... Gemini... and Apollo programs
had proven that we could send people into space... To orbit the Earth.... Fly out beyond
our planet... Then land on the moon and walk among its ancient crater.
The collective will to send people beyond our planet faded in times of economic
uncertainty, war, and shifting priorities. And yet, just five years after Apollo ended,
scientists launched a new vision that was just as profound and even more far-reaching.
It didn't all go smoothly. Early computer problems threatened to doom Voyager 2. Then
its radio receiver failed, forcing engineers to use a back up. Now, after more than three
and a half decades of successful operations, the twin spacecraft are sending back
information on their flight into interstellar space. Along the way, they have revealed a
solar system rich beyond our imagining.
The journey was made possible by a rare alignment of the planets, a configuration that
occurs only once every 176 years. That enabled the craft to go from planet to planet,
accelerating as they entered the gravitational field of one, then flying out to the next.
The Voyagers carried a battery of scientific equipment to collect data on the unknown
worlds in their path. That included a pair of vidicom cameras, and a data transfer rate
slower than a dialup modem.
on here speculate with the secret space programme, or not.
This is an achievement ............
BREAKING: NASA Confirms Voyager 1 Probe Has Left the Solar System
6eaPoB7l3OU
====================================================
http://static.bbci.co.uk/frameworks/barlesque/2.48.3/desktop/3.5/img/blq-blocks_grey_alpha.png
12 September 2013 Last updated at 19:00
Voyager probe 'leaves Solar System'By Jonathan Amos
Science correspondent, BBC News
http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/66509000/jpg/_66509267_r2620085-voyager_spacecraft-spl.jpg
Voyager artist impression Voyager will live out its days circling the centre of our Milky Way Galaxy
The Voyager-1 spacecraft has become the first manmade object to leave the Solar
System.Scientists say the probe's instruments indicate it has moved beyond the bubble
of hot gas from our Sun and is now moving in the space between the stars.Launched in
1977, Voyager was sent initially to study the outer planets, but then just kept on going.
Today, the veteran Nasa mission is almost 19 billion km (12 billion miles) from home.
This distance is so vast that it takes 17 hours now for a radio signal sent from Voyager
to reach receivers here on Earth.
"This is really a key milestone that we'd been hoping we would reach when we started
this project over 40 years ago - that we would get a spacecraft into interstellar space,"
said Prof Ed Stone, the chief scientist on the venture.
"Scientifically it's a major milestone, but also historically - this is one of those journeys
of exploration like circumnavigating the globe for the first time or having a footprint on
the Moon for the first time. This is the first time we've begun to explore the space
between the stars," he told BBC News. Sensors on Voyager had been indicating for
some time that its local environment had changed. The data that finally convinced the
mission team to call the jump to interstellar space came from the probe's Plasma Wave
Science (PWS) instrument. This can measure the density of charged particles in
Voyager's vicinity.
Readings taken in April/May this year and October/November last year revealed a near-
100-fold jump in the number of protons occupying every cubic metre of space.
Mission chief scientist Professor Ed Stone: "We got there!"
Scientists have long theorised such a spike would eventually be observed if Voyager
could get beyond the influence of the magnetic fields and particle wind that billow from
the surface of the Sun.
When the Voyager team put the new data together with information from the other
instruments onboard, they calculated the moment of escape to have occurred on or
about 25 August, 2012. This conclusion is contained in a report published by the journal
Science.
"This is big; it's really impressive - the first human-made object to make it out into
interstellar space," said Prof Don Gurnett from the University of Iowa and the principal
investigator on the PWS. On 25 August, 2012, Voyager-1 was some 121 Astronomical
Units away. That is, 121 times the separation between the Earth and the Sun.
Breaching the boundary, known technically as the heliopause, was, said the English
Astronomer Royal, Prof Sir Martin Rees, a remarkable achievement: "It's utterly
astonishing that this fragile artefact, based on 1970s technology, can signal its presence
from this immense distance."
Although now embedded in the gas, dust and magnetic fields from other stars, Voyager
still feels a gravitational tug from the Sun, just as some comets do that lie even further
out in space. But to all intents and purposes, it has left what most people would define
as the Solar System. It is now in a completely new domain.
Voyager-1 departed Earth on 5 September 1977, a few days after its sister spacecraft, Voyager-2.
The pair's primary objective was to survey the planets Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and
Neptune - a task they completed in 1989.
They were then steered towards deep space. It is expected that their plutonium power
sources will stop supplying electricity in about 10 years, at which point their instruments
and their 20W transmitters will die.
Voyager-1 will not approach another star for nearly 40,000 years, even though it is
moving at 45km/s (100,000mph).
"Voyager-1 will be in orbit around the centre of our galaxy with all its stars for billions of
years," said Prof Stone.
http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/69809000/jpg/_69809416_dot.jpg
Pale Blue Dot In 1990, Voyager-1 looked back and took a picture of Earth - a "pale blue dot"
The probe's work is not quite done, however. For as long as they have working
instruments, scientists will want to sample the new environment.The new region
through which Voyager is now flying was generated and sculpted by big stars that
exploded millions of years ago.There is indirect evidence and models to describe the
conditions in this medium, but Voyager can now measure them for real and report back.
The renowned British planetary scientist Prof Fred Taylor commented: "As a young post-
doc, I went to [Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory] and worked for a while with the team
that was doing the science definition study for the Outer Planets Grand Tour, which later
became Voyager.
"It seemed so incredible and exciting to think we would see and explore Jupiter and
Saturn close up, let alone Uranus and Neptune.
"The idea that the spacecraft would then exit the Solar System altogether was so way
out, figuratively as well as literally, that we didn't even discuss it then, although I
suppose we knew it would happen someday. Forty-three years later, that day has
arrived, and Voyager is still finding new frontiers."
http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/69806000/jpg/_69806156_2a196dfb-fba1-4851-8c8d-22945bd1e250.jpg
Schematic of the Solar System The Sun sits in an extensive bubble of hot gas called the
heliosphere
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-24026153
======================================================
Cosmic Journeys : Voyager Journey to the Stars
seXbrauRTY4
Published on 6 Apr 2013
Cosmic Journeys examines the great promise of the Voyager mission and where it will
lead us in our grand ambition to move out beyond our home planet. The two Voyager
spacecraft are part of an ancient quest to push beyond our boundaries... to see what
lies beyond the horizon. Now tens of billions of kilometers from Earth, two spacecraft
are streaking out into the void. What will we learn about the Galaxy, the Universe, and
ourselves from Voyager's epic Journey to the stars?
December 19, 1972... the splashdown of the Apollo 17 crew capsule marked the end of
the golden age of manned spaceflight. The Mercury.... Gemini... and Apollo programs
had proven that we could send people into space... To orbit the Earth.... Fly out beyond
our planet... Then land on the moon and walk among its ancient crater.
The collective will to send people beyond our planet faded in times of economic
uncertainty, war, and shifting priorities. And yet, just five years after Apollo ended,
scientists launched a new vision that was just as profound and even more far-reaching.
It didn't all go smoothly. Early computer problems threatened to doom Voyager 2. Then
its radio receiver failed, forcing engineers to use a back up. Now, after more than three
and a half decades of successful operations, the twin spacecraft are sending back
information on their flight into interstellar space. Along the way, they have revealed a
solar system rich beyond our imagining.
The journey was made possible by a rare alignment of the planets, a configuration that
occurs only once every 176 years. That enabled the craft to go from planet to planet,
accelerating as they entered the gravitational field of one, then flying out to the next.
The Voyagers carried a battery of scientific equipment to collect data on the unknown
worlds in their path. That included a pair of vidicom cameras, and a data transfer rate
slower than a dialup modem.