1,203,183,801 visitors served.
1,203,183,801 visitors served. |
|
 Dictionary/ thesaurus |  Medical dictionary |  Legal dictionary |  Financial dictionary |  Acronyms |  Idioms |  Encyclopedia |  Wikipedia encyclopedia | ? |
Voyager 1 |
0.03 sec. |
|
For the album by The Verve, see .
) Trajectory of Voyager 1 using Celestia The Voyager 1 spacecraft is a 722-kilogram robotic space probe of the outer solar system and beyond, launched September 5, 1977, and currently operational. It visited Jupiter and Saturn and was the first probe to provide detailed images of the moons of these planets. Voyager 1 is the farthest human-made object from Earth, traveling away from both the Earth and the Sun at a relatively faster speed than any other probe. Though its sister-craft, Voyager 2, was launched one month earlier, Voyager 2 will never pass Voyager 1. Neither will the New Horizons mission to Pluto, despite being launched from Earth at a faster speed than both Voyager craft, since during its flight Voyager 1 benefited from a number of gravity assisted speed boosts.[1] As of August 10, 2007, Voyager 1 is over 15.49 terameters (15.491012 meters, or 15.49109 km, 103.6 AU, 14.36 light-hours, or 9.6 billion miles) from the Sun, and has thus entered the heliosheath, the termination shock region between the solar system and interstellar space, a vast area where the Sun's influence gives way to the other bodies in the galaxy. If Voyager 1 is still functioning when it finally passes the heliopause, scientists will get their first direct measurements of the conditions in the interstellar medium. At this distance, signals from Voyager 1 take more than fourteen hours to reach its control center at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a joint project of NASA and Caltech near Pasadena, California. Voyager 1 is on a hyperbolic trajectory and has achieved escape velocity, meaning that its orbit will not return to the inner solar system. Along with Pioneer 10, Pioneer 11, New Horizons, and Voyager 2, Voyager 1 is an interstellar probe. Voyager 1 had as its primary targets the planets Jupiter and Saturn and their associated moons and rings; its current mission is the detection of the heliopause and particle measurements of solar wind and the interstellar medium. Both Voyager probes are powered by three radioisotope thermoelectric generators, which have far outlasted their originally intended lifespan, and are now expected to continue to generate enough power to keep communicating with Earth until at least around the year 2020. Mission profileVoyager 1 was originally planned as Mariner 11 of the Mariner program. From the outset, it was designed to take advantage of the then-new technique of gravity assist. Luckily, the development of interplanetary probes coincided with an alignment of the planets called the Grand Tour. The Grand Tour was a linked series of gravity assists that, with only the minimal fuel needed for course corrections, would enable a single probe to visit all four of the solar system's gas giant planets: Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. The identical Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 probes were designed with the Grand Tour in mind, and their launches were timed to enable the Grand Tour if desired. Because of this alignment, Voyager could visit each of these planets in just twelve years, instead of the 30 that would usually be required. Voyager 1 was launched on September 5, 1977 by NASA from Cape Canaveral aboard a Titan IIIE Centaur rocket, shortly after its sister craft, Voyager 2 on August 20, 1977. Despite being launched after Voyager 2, Voyager 1 was sent on a faster trajectory so it reached Jupiter and Saturn before its sister craft. Initially, an underburn in the second stage of the Titan IIIE rocket left an estimated one second's worth of fuel remaining in that stage. Although ground crews were worried that Voyager 1 would not make it to Jupiter, the Centaur upper stage proved to have enough fuel to compensate. For details on the Voyager instrument packages, see the separate article on the Voyager program. JupiterVoyager 1 began photographing Jupiter in January 1979. Its closest approach to Jupiter was on March 5, 1979, at a distance of 349,000 kilometers (217,000 miles) from its center. Due to the greater resolution allowed by close approach, most observations of the moons, rings, magnetic fields, and radiation environment of the Jupiter system were made in the 48-hour period bracketing closest approach. It finished photographing the planet in April.The two Voyager spacecraft made a number of important discoveries about Jupiter and its satellites. The most surprising was the existence of volcanic activity on Io, which had not been observed from the ground or by Pioneer 10 or 11.
SaturnThe gravity assist at Jupiter was successful, and the spacecraft went on to visit Saturn. Voyager 1's Saturn flyby occurred in November 1980, with the closest approach on November 12 when it came within 124,000 kilometers (77,000 miles) of the planet's cloud-tops. The craft detected complex structures in Saturn's rings, and studied the atmospheres of Saturn and Titan. Because of the earlier discovery of a thick atmosphere on Titan, the Voyager controllers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory elected for Voyager 1 to make a close approach of Titan and terminate its Grand Tour. (For the continuation of the Grand Tour, see the Uranus and Neptune sections of the Voyager 2 article.) The Titan-approach trajectory caused an additional gravity assist that took Voyager 1 out of the plane of the ecliptic, thus ending its planetary science mission.
Interstellar missionIt is estimated that both Voyager craft have sufficient electrical power to operate at least some instruments until 2020, which will be 43 years after launch.
Heliopause) Voyager 1 is in the heliosheath. As Voyager 1 heads for interstellar space, its instruments continue to study the solar system; Jet Propulsion Laboratory scientists are using the plasma wave experiments aboard Voyager 1 and 2 to look for the heliopause. Scientists at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory believe that Voyager 1 entered the termination shock in February 2003.[2] Some other scientists have expressed doubt, discussed in the journal Nature of November 6 2003. In a scientific session at the American Geophysical Union meeting in New Orleans on the morning of May 25 2005, Dr. Ed Stone presented evidence that Voyager 1 crossed the termination shock in December 2004. [1] The issue will not be resolved for some months as other data become available, since Voyager's solar-wind detector ceased functioning in 1990. However, in May 2005 a NASA press release said that consensus was that Voyager 1 was now in the heliosheath.[3] Scientists believe the craft will reach the heliopause in 2015. Current statusAs of August 22, 2007, Voyager 1 was at a distance of 103.6 AU (approximately 15.5 terameters, 9.7 billion miles or 0.0016 light years) from the Sun, which makes it the most distant human-made object from Earth.[4] At this distance, it is more distant from the Sun than any known natural solar system object, including 90377 Sedna. Though Sedna has an orbit that takes it 975 AU away from the Sun at aphelion, as of 2006 it is less than 90 AU away from the Sun and approaching its perihelion at 76 AU.[5][6]) Current location and trajectories of Pioneer and Voyager spacecraft Voyager 1 is not heading towards any particular star, but in 40,000 years it will be within 1.7 light years of the star AC+793888 in the Camelopardis constellation. On March 31 2006, the amateur radio operators from AMSAT Germany tracked and received data from Voyager 1 using the 20 metre (66 ft) dish at Bochum with a long integration technique. Its data were checked and verified against data from the Deep Space Network station at Madrid, Spain.[7] This is believed to be the first such tracking of Voyager. Voyager 1, as of September 2006, is at 12.22° declination and 17.051 hours right ascension, placing it in the constellation Ophiuchus. NASA continues daily tracking of the spacecraft with the Deep Space Network stations. See also
References1. ^ New Horizons Salutes Voyager. New Horizons (August 17, 2006). Retrieved on 2007-08-07. 2. ^ Kate Tobin. "Spacecraft reaches edge of solar system", CNN.com, November 5, 2003. Retrieved on 2007-08-07. 3. ^ Voyager Enters Solar System's Final Frontier. NASA (May 24, 2005). Retrieved on 2007-08-07. 4. ^ Pioneering NASA Spacecraft Mark Thirty Years of Flight Aug 20, 2007, Week Ending March 9 2007 5. ^ CNN: "NASA: Voyager I enters solar system's final frontier", May 25, 2005 6. ^ CNN: "NASA: Voyager II detects solar system's edge", May 23, 2006 7. ^ AMSAT-DL article in German; ARRL article in English External links
National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA logo Motto: For the Benefit of All[1] NASA seal Agency overview Formed 29 July 1958 Headquarters Washington D.C. Annual Budget $16. ..... Click the link for more information. robotic spacecraft is a spacecraft with no humans on board, that is usually under telerobotic control. A robotic spacecraft designed to make scientific research measurements is often called a space probe. ..... Click the link for more information. space probe is a scientific space mission in which a robotic spacecraft leaves the vicinity of the Earth and approaches the Moon or enters interplanetary space. Space agencies of the Soviet Union, the United States, Europe, Russia, and Japan have all launched probes to other ..... Click the link for more information. Solar System or solar system[a] consists of the Sun and the other celestial objects gravitationally bound to it: the eight planets, their 166 known moons,[1] ..... Click the link for more information. September 5 is the 1st day of the year (2nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 0 days remaining. Events
..... Click the link for more information. 19th century - 20th century - 21st century 1940s 1950s 1960s - 1970s - 1980s 1990s 2000s 1974 1975 1976 - 1977 - 1978 1979 1980
..... Click the link for more information. Jupiter This processed color image of Jupiter was produced in 1990 by the U.S. Geological Survey from a Voyager image captured in 1979. The colors have been enhanced to bring out detail. ..... Click the link for more information. Saturn Saturn, as seen by Cassini Orbital characteristics[1][2] Epoch J2000 Aphelion distance: 1,513,325,783 km 10.11595804 AU Perihelion distance: 1,353,572,956 km 9. ..... Click the link for more information. EARTH was a short-lived Japanese vocal trio which released 6 singles and 1 album between 2000 and 2001. Their greatest hit, their debut single "time after time", peaked at #13 in the Oricon singles chart. ..... Click the link for more information. The Sun Observation data Mean distance from Earth 1.4961011 m (8.31 min at light speed) Visual brightness (V) −26.74m [1] Absolute magnitude 4. ..... Click the link for more information. Voyager 2 is an unmanned interplanetary spacecraft, launched on August 20, 1977. It is identical to its sister Voyager program craft, Voyager 1, but unlike Voyager 1, Voyager 2 ..... Click the link for more information. New Horizons is a robotic spacecraft mission conducted by NASA. It is expected to be the first spacecraft to fly by and study the dwarf planet Pluto and its moons, Charon, Nix, and Hydra. NASA may also approve flybys of one or more other Kuiper Belt Objects. ..... Click the link for more information. Pluto Map of Pluto based on Charon eclipses, approximately true colour and giving the highest resolution currently possible Discovery Discovered by: Clyde W. ..... Click the link for more information. In orbital mechanics and aerospace engineering, a gravitational slingshot or gravity assist is the use of the gravity of a planet or other celestial body to alter the path and speed of a spacecraft. Passing by such a body imparts some fraction of that to the spacecraft. ..... Click the link for more information. August 10 is the 1st day of the year (2nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 0 days remaining. ..... Click the link for more information. 20th century - 21st century - 22nd century 1970s 1980s 1990s - 2000s - 2010s 2020s 2030s 2004 2005 2006 - 2007 - 2008 2009 2010 2007 by topic: News by month Jan - Feb - Mar - Apr - May - Jun ..... Click the link for more information. 1 metre = The metre or meter[1](symbol: m) is the fundamental unit of length in the International System of Units (SI).SI units 1000 mm 0 cm US customary / Imperial units 0 ft 0 in ..... Click the link for more information. 1 astronomical unit = The SI units 0109 m 0106 km Astronomical units 010-6 pc 010−6 ly US customary / Imperial units 0109 ft 0106 mi ..... Click the link for more information. 1,000,000,000 (alternately known as one thousand million and one billion, see below) is the natural number following 999,999,999 and preceding 1,000,000,001. In scientific notation, it is written as 109. ..... Click the link for more information. interstellar medium (or ISM) is the name astronomers give to the gas and dust that pervade interstellar space. While the interstellar medium refers to the matter that exists between the stars within a galaxy, the energy, in the form of electromagnetic radiation, that ..... Click the link for more information. Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) is a NASA research center located in the cities of Pasadena and La Cañada Flintridge, near Los Angeles, California, USA. Managed by the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), it builds and operates unmanned spacecraft for the National ..... Click the link for more information. California Institute of Technology (commonly referred to as Caltech)[1] is a private, coeducational research university located in Pasadena, California, in the United States. Caltech maintains a strong emphasis on the natural sciences and engineering. ..... Click the link for more information. Pasadena, California Location in the Los Angeles County and the State of California Coordinates: Country United States State California County Los Angeles ..... Click the link for more information. In astrodynamics or celestial mechanics a hyperbolic trajectory is an orbit with the eccentricity greater than 1. Under standard assumptions a body traveling along this trajectory will coast to infinity, arriving there with hyperbolic excess velocity relative to the central body. ..... Click the link for more information. escape velocity is the speed where the kinetic energy of an object is equal in magnitude to its potential energy in a gravitational field. It is commonly described as the speed needed to "break free" from a gravitational field; however, this is not true for objects under ..... Click the link for more information. Pioneer 10 (Pioneer-F) was the first spacecraft to travel through the asteroid belt and to make direct observations of Jupiter. It was launched from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station's Launch Complex 36A on March 2, 1972. ..... Click the link for more information. Pioneer 11 was the second mission (after its sister probe Pioneer 10) to investigate Jupiter and the outer solar system and the first to explore the planet Saturn and its main rings. ..... Click the link for more information. New Horizons is a robotic spacecraft mission conducted by NASA. It is expected to be the first spacecraft to fly by and study the dwarf planet Pluto and its moons, Charon, Nix, and Hydra. NASA may also approve flybys of one or more other Kuiper Belt Objects. ..... Click the link for more information. Voyager 2 is an unmanned interplanetary spacecraft, launched on August 20, 1977. It is identical to its sister Voyager program craft, Voyager 1, but unlike Voyager 1, Voyager 2 ..... Click the link for more information. An interstellar probe is a space probe which has left -- or is expected to leave -- the solar system and enter interstellar space (typically defined as the region beyond the heliopause). ..... Click the link for more information. This article is copied from an article on Wikipedia® - the free encyclopedia created and edited by online user community. The text was not checked or edited by anyone on our staff. Although the vast majority of the Wikipedia® encyclopedia articles provide accurate and timely information please do not assume the accuracy of any particular article. This article is distributed under the terms of GNU Free Documentation License. How to thank TFD for its existence? Tell a friend about us, add a link to this page, add the site to iGoogle, or visit webmaster's page for free fun content. |
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
? Mentioned in | ? References in periodicals archive | |
|---|---|---|
17, the venerable Voyager 1 spacecraft became the most distant explorer in the solar system. 18, 1998--Shomiti Systems, a leading provider of Fast LAN management solutions, announced Voyager 1. |
 |
| Free Tools: |
For surfers:
Browser extension |
Word of the Day |
Help
For webmasters: Free content | Linking | Lookup box | Double-click lookup | Partner with us |
|
|---|
Disclaimer |
Privacy policy |
Feedback | Copyright © 2009 Farlex, Inc.)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
Printer friendly
Cite / link
Email
Feedback
Voyager 1
