Voyager 1 Reaches The 'magnetic Highway' Gets Ready For Interstellar Space

[adriantc 0]

I am happy to let you know that Voyager 1 has reached, what NASA's scientists name, "the magnetic highway" - a part of space where the sun's magnetic field lines connect with the interstellar ones. It still hasn't reached the outer edge of this zone, that is due to happen anywhere from a few months to a few years. (see the photo below for a more "clear picture") Even NASA is not sure since nothing functioning (yes unbelievably Voyager 1 is still functioning... in part at least as some of its sensors have malfunctioned or have been disabled) has reached this far and it is hard to pinpoint where is the actual edge of our solar system. It is so far away that radio waves need over 17 hours to reach Earth. And as a tribute to human engineering Voyager 1 will continue to function at least for 15-20 more years (for as long as its plutonium core is going to provide energy to power its systems). So it will beam back information for years to come. Absolutely impressive feat... can't really put that in words.

 

I find the Pionner and Voyager crafts to be one of the best (if not the best) investments humanity has even done. Far from their initial goal, going into space with those records, is a huge statement for mankind. It may very well be the last men made thing to survive our possible self-destruction. Only the remote possibility that one day space faring civilization will encounter it and try to understand that data (a small part of our civilization) is worth almost everything. Someone was saying that once mankind will take for the stars (if ever) we should retrieve it and display it in a museum. But I believe its place is out there, beyond the final frontier, a small bottle in a magnificent ocean. Something to remind the universe that we once lived here. This may be our final legacy.

 

You can read the source here.

 

[rpgsearcherz 5]

This is some pretty crazy stuff! I'm wondering what the next step will be though. If we're able to get to the outside perimeter of the solar system, but most of the systems end up offline by doing so, it makes me question whether or not we'll be able to push further than that and get real information from outside the solar system as well (especially things like images).

[adriantc 0]

This is some pretty crazy stuff! I'm wondering what the next step will be though. If we're able to get to the outside perimeter of the solar system, but most of the systems end up offline by doing so, it makes me question whether or not we'll be able to push further than that and get real information from outside the solar system as well (especially things like images).

If most of Voyager's sensors are still online after so many years I am sure they will still be functioning for many years to come. However as I mentioned it does have a plutonium power source (known as radioisotope thermoelectric generator) which works on the principle of radioactive decay which produces heat and by the use of thermocouples generates electricity. Being a nuclear power source with a pretty high halving rate (halving every 87.7 years) it will end stop providing enough power to Voyager around 2025. Maybe by that time we will not need it to send information back to Earth... maybe some other craft from Earth with more advanced sensors will overtake it. Also I am pretty sure there aren't very many interesting things in the space between the solar systems, specially nothing interesting to photograph.

What is more important about Voyager is the golden record rather then the few information it can send back. It does provide whoever finds it (hopefully an advanced civilization will find it and understand it long after we are gone) a remainder of who we were and where we were. As a trivia.... there seems to have been a big debate whether the naked image of a men and a women should be engraved on the Golden record. As if an alien civilization would giggle when they see them