Latest news with #Voyagers1
Yahoo
18-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
The Golden Records tell the story of Earth. Will alien worlds ever find them?
In 1977, NASA launched Voyagers 1 and 2 from Cape Canaveral, Florida into space to embark on a grand tour of the far reaches of our solar system. Mounted on board each probe was a 12-inch gold-plated copper disk—a cosmic 'message in a bottle' engraved with sights, sounds, and depictions of life on Earth, collectively known as the Golden Records—on the slim chance some far-off alien civilization might discover them. And in Disney and Pixar's animated film Elio, in theaters June 20, that's exactly what happens when main character Elio encounters aliens who believe he is Earth's leader. 'It's meant to be a sort of a letter of introduction to any culture who might find the probe,' says Bethany Ehlmann, a planetary scientist at the California Institute of Technology and a 2013 National Geographic Emerging Explorer, of the real-life Golden Records. Though these gilded greetings were partly intended for an alien audience, they mostly served as a message to humans and our tiny blue marble planet. 'It's a love letter to Earth and all that we have come through to get to the point where we could send these probes to understand our solar system.' But where are the Golden Records now—and how much longer are they intended to last in space? We spoke to the experts, including Ehlmann, to find out. When tasked with figuring out what to include in the intergalactic mixtape aboard the Voyager probes, renowned astronomer Carl Sagan assembled a team of scientists, artists, and engineers. For a true depiction of life on Earth aboard humankind's most distant physical emissary, the team included a variety of sounds associated with daily life and nature, like bird calls, humpback whale songs, children's laughter, footsteps, heartbeats, brain wave scans, and a kiss. There are also 90 minutes of music contained on the disk, including Western classical compositions from Mozart, Bach, Beethoven, and Stravinsky, Senegalese percussion music, Australian Aboriginal songs, and Chuck Berry's 'Johnny B. Goode.' (The close of cosmos, and golden voices in the stars.) The carefully thought-out record, designed to endure space travel for billions of years, also consists of spoken greetings in 55 modern and ancient languages, as well as 115 analog-encoded photographs of Earth and its inhabitants. Engraved on the cover of these records is a map to help find one's way to Earth relative to nearby known, flashing, dense cores of stars called pulsars. There are etched diagrams of a hydrogen atom—the most common element in the universe—and instructions for playing each record. Each disk is enclosed in a protective, gold-plated aluminum jacket, together with a cartridge and a needle to play it. "The spacecraft will be encountered and the record played only if there are advanced space-faring civilizations in interstellar space," Sagan, leader of the Voyager Golden Record project, wrote. "But the launching of this 'bottle' into the cosmic 'ocean' says something very hopeful about life on this planet." (Dear Voyagers: How your billion-year journey carries true love.) Over the years, the Voyager probes flew by the solar system's most distant four planets at a rate of 35,000 miles per hour, sending back detailed views of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and their moons. Voyager 2 flying by Uranus and Neptune is the only time humanity has seen these worlds up close. After completing their primary missions to collectively fly by all four outer planets in 1989, the twin probes kept chugging along through the vast outer reaches of the solar system. Voyager 1 and 2 exited the solar system and entered interstellar space in 2012 and 2018, respectively. At more than 15 billion miles from Earth, Voyager 1 has become the most distant human-made object in space. Voyager 2, in second place, is now about 13 billion miles away. The interstellar environment they're in contains a stew of cosmic gas, dust, and rays. The twin Voyager probes are equipped with radiation-resistant parts, but the onslaught of charged particles in their current neck of the woods still pose a threat to their aging electronics. Both Voyager spacecrafts are still collecting and sending back data, updating humans on their intergalactic adventures, albeit slowly—it takes nearly 20 hours for these signals to reach Earth, given the immense distance they need to travel. We're now reaching the end of the Voyager missions, as the twin probes' plutonium power supplies are running out of juice. The Voyager team is attempting to extend their lifetime for as long as they can by shutting down non-essential instruments like heaters to conserve power. 'More than 47 years into the mission, there's very little power left,' says Suzanne "Suzy" Dodd, the current project manager for the Voyager missions. 'The goal of the mission is to get it to 50 years.' Even after the probe's science mission ends, though, the Golden Records will keep quietly drifting further and further into the cosmic abyss, likely for millions and even billions of years.'Long after we've lost communications with the spacecraft, it'll still be traveling with this record—a time capsule,' Dodd says. She remarks that it's exciting 'to think about a little piece of us, a little piece of what Earth and humanity is all about, traveling around the center of our galaxy to be found by whatever being might be out there.' But, as Dodd points out, there are enormous physical and chronological distances involved. It's going to take around 40,000 years for the probes to drift into the vicinity of any other star system, when Voyager 1 will pass within 1.6 light-years of the star Gliese 445. Around the same time, Voyager 2 will be within 1.7 light-years of the star Ross 248. The Golden Records have left a huge cosmic impact. According to Ehlmann, most spacecrafts that followed the Voyager mission included some sort of message from our Earthly abode. 'People sometimes think of science as a cold and calculating endeavor, but really it's the expression of curiosity and awe,' she says. 'It's an ability to leave your mark in the universe.' And almost fifty years after they first took flight, our pair of plucky robot emissaries to the stars continues embarking on the deepest journey ever into space. 'Who knows? The Voyager probes, a million years from now, may end up in some alien museum,' Ehlmann says. 'It's exciting to imagine.'
Time of India
06-06-2025
- Science
- Time of India
How To Find Planet B, And Get There Alive
Earth will have a meltdown. What are our options? Tardigrades are little critters that were around before dinosaurs, and will eventually outlast us on Earth. They are so tough they can survive exposure to -272°C (cooler than liquid helium) and 150°C, which is quite a bit hotter than your pressure cooker. And Earth will be hotter than that in a few hundred million years – not entirely because of your car's tailpipe emissions. As our Sun grows older, it will expand, making Earth hot like Venus with its middle-age spread. So, we should start planning our escape now. But where can we go? Lisa Kaltenegger's book Alien Earths has useful pointers for wannabe galactic hitchhikers. As the founding director of Carl Sagan Institute at Cornell University, Kaltenegger is an authority, but she's got no recommendations, yet. Ideally, you wouldn't want to travel too far because you are – as The Matrix's Agent Jones put it – 'only human'. How long will you live – 100, 120 years? Unless you hit Star Trek's fantastical 'warp speed' – faster than light – you can't go far in that time. Voyagers 1 & 2 left Earth in 1977, and they won't get close to another star for 40,000 years. So, space travel's a bummer. Besides, space is mostly empty. Looking out the window will mean death by boredom. Step on the gas, and a 1mg speck of space dust could destroy your ship. So, speed and time are not on your side. Worse, your choice of space rock is a gamble. You have chosen it based on signs like the signature of its light, which tells you something about temperature on the planet's surface and the materials you'll find on it. Say, everything's perfect, and this planet circles our Sun's nearest neighbour, Proxima Centauri, which is about 40tn km away. You gather bag, baggage, family, and everything else that Moses took, and set sail on your ark. But…that light signal from Proxima took four years to reach Earth. Your data was already four years old. By the time you get there – cryofrozen, probably – in, say, 40,000 years, that planet may have ceased to exist. What then? The choice of your future home is complicated by other factors also, Kaltenegger shows. Maybe you're looking too hard for an Earth-like planet and missing some gems. You want oxygen? Earth had precious little in its atmosphere till cyanobacteria appeared over 2bn years ago. They could split water, use hydrogen and free up oxygen. That's how oxygen increased in air. If Earth formed at 12am, atmospheric oxygen touched 15% concentration only at 10pm. And now, a few seconds before midnight, it's at 21%. So, by looking for ready oxygen, you might miss some good candidate planets. Likewise, searching only for a planet with green plants might be a mistake. Plants on Earth are green because sunlight is strong and they absorb its red and violet wavelengths, while reflecting the green. But on a liveable planet around a red star – whose light has less energy – plants may need to absorb all the available light. Hence, their leaves could appear black! Our next 'Earth' will definitely need some getting used to. There's so much to figure out and fix. But we can't do that if we make this Earth unlivable in the next decade or two. Have you checked your car's tailpipe emissions? Facebook Twitter Linkedin Email Disclaimer Views expressed above are the author's own.
Yahoo
08-03-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Days Numbered For Voyager Probes As NASA Shuts Off Instruments To Prolong Life
No human-made objects have traveled further into the final frontier than Voyager 1 and Voyager 2. However, both space probes are reaching the end of their service lives. NASA announced that engineers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory are shutting off instruments on both spacecraft to limit energy use and prolong their time in operation. Since their launches in 1977, both Voyager probes have traveled over 12 billion miles from Earth and entered interstellar space. Both Voyager probes are equipped with a radioisotope power system, a nuclear battery that uses the heat of decaying plutonium to generate electricity. The system produced 470 watts of power at launch, but that figure decreased over time as the plutonium deteriorated. NASA states the power output was 335 watts at the start of 1997, and it has fallen by 7 watts every year. With that information, the nuclear batteries are producing around 139 watts right now. Read more: There's A Relic Runway From America's Failed Supersonic Future Hiding In The Everglades NASA personnel have openly stated that the agency's goal is to have both Voyager probes still operational for their 50th anniversary in 2027. The probes can only make it two more years by carefully managing the shrinking power supply. Each spacecraft launched with ten scientific instruments, and only three on each probe will be powered by the end of March after recent cullings. They'll be down to two instruments by 2026. It's not like flipping a light switch, though — there's a good chance that the instruments won't be able to be turned back on. Linda Spilker, a Voyager project scientist at JPL, said: "Every minute of every day, the Voyagers explore a region where no spacecraft has gone before. That also means every day could be our last. But that day could also bring another interstellar revelation. So, we're pulling out all the stops, doing what we can to make sure Voyagers 1 and 2 continue their trailblazing for the maximum time possible." Besides the fading nuclear batteries, the Voyager probes have also run into technical issues after nearly a half-century of hurtling through space. Voyager 1 has dealt with a degrading diaphragm clogging its thruster fuel tubes with silicon dioxide. The probe doesn't use the thrusters to move but to keep its communication systems pointed toward Earth to send and receive data. Troubleshooting these problems can be an anxiety-inducing experience because it takes nearly an entire day to send a command to either probe with the vast distances involved. It can't be understated how monumental an effort the Voyager program has become to keep both probes still going outside of our Solar System for so long. As a point of reference, President Jimmy Carter was sworn into office in 1977, the same year as the Voyager launches, and died last year after being the first president to reach their 100th birthday. Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 are still exploring the unknown. Want more like this? Join the Jalopnik newsletter to get the latest auto news sent straight to your inbox... Read the original article on Jalopnik.
Yahoo
06-03-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
NASA works to extend Voyager spacecraft mission again: 'Every day could be our last'
For nearly 50 years, Nasa's twin Voyager spacecraft have just kept swimming – or zooming through space, collecting data from interstellar space farther than any other mission. NASA is trying to keep both spacecraft alive once again by taking additional steps to conserve energy. "Every minute of every day, the Voyagers explore a region where no spacecraft has gone before," Voyager project scientist Linda Spilker said in a NASA release. "That also means every day could be our last. But that day could also bring another interstellar revelation. So, we're pulling out all the stops, doing what we can to make sure Voyagers 1 and 2 continue their trailblazing for the maximum time possible." Voyager 1 and 2 launched in 1977 on a grand tour of the solar system, making flybys of all our planets – just not Pluto, which was still classified as a planet at the time. Voyager 1 And 2 Continue Offering New Mysteries From Interstellar Space After successfully completing each half of their tours, the spacecraft kept going (and going… and going) traveling in opposite directions out into the universe. According to NASA, Voyager 1 is more than 15 billion miles from Earth, and Voyager 2 is over 13 billion miles. The space agency continues to receive data from both space probes through the Deep Space Network even years after they crossed the heliosphere, the protective bubble of solar wind considered the boundary of our solar system. While both Voyager spacecraft started their mission launching from Florida with 10 science instruments, the spacecraft operators at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California continued to shut off instruments to conserve energy. After this month, only three instruments on each will remain operating. NASA announced engineers shut off the cosmic ray subsystem experiment on Voyager 1 on Feb. 25 and will shut off Voyager 2's low-energy charged particle instrument on March 24. Both spacecraft rely on a radioisotope power system that generates electricity from the heat of decaying plutonium. As each year passes, they each lose about 4 watts of power. "The Voyagers have been deep space rock stars since launch, and we want to keep it that way as long as possible," Voyager Project Manager Suzanne Dodd said. "But electrical power is running low. If we don't turn off an instrument on each Voyager now, they would probably have only a few more months of power before we would need to declare end of mission." Don't count the mission out yet. Voyagers teams in California have had an action-packed few years and decades working through issues with both spacecraft, from communication outages to mis-pointing antennae. NASA said with the latest energy conservation game plan, the Voyagers should have enough power to operate for another year before engineers shut off another article source: NASA works to extend Voyager spacecraft mission again: 'Every day could be our last'
Yahoo
06-03-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
NASA is shutting down parts of Voyager 1 and 2 to extend their lifespan
Nearly 50 years after they were first launched, Voyager 1 and 2 are still traveling around interstellar space — though they've faced some setbacks over the years. Now, NASA has announced that the twin Voyager spacecraft are losing some of their features in a bid to extend their lifespans in the face of a diminishing power supply. On February 25, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) turned off Voyager 1's cosmic ray subsystem experiment and on March 25, it will shut down Voyager 2's low-energy charged particle instrument. "The Voyagers have been deep space rock stars since launch, and we want to keep it that way as long as possible," said Suzanne Dodd, Voyager project manager at the JPL. "But electrical power is running low. If we don't turn off an instrument on each Voyager now, they would probably have only a few more months of power before we would need to declare end of mission." Each probe will continue to run three science instruments, but hold another seven instruments which have turned off over time. Just last October, NASA shut down Voyager 2's plasma science instrument. However, both spacecraft have experienced recent issues. Last June, Voyager 1 finally starting running properly again, following seven months of technical issues, including unreadable data. It had a similar issue two years prior. In 2023, Voyager 2 went dark for two weeks after requiring technical assistance three years earlier. NASA still puts a lot of value in the Voyager probes. "Every minute of every day, the Voyagers explore a region where no spacecraft has gone before," said Linda Spilker, Voyager project scientist at JPL. "That also means every day could be our last. But that day could also bring another interstellar revelation. So, we're pulling out all the stops, doing what we can to make sure Voyagers 1 and 2 continue their trailblazing for the maximum time possible." Maybe at least until they hit 50 years in 2027? The slightly more cynical take on NASA 'pulling out all the stops' to keep them going is that they'd certainly love for the probes to be functional for their 50th anniversary in 2027 — which feels like a tall order despite the agency's best efforts.
