The ship 'Voyager 1' has already gone into interstellar space - The País.com (Spain)

automatic probe Voyager 1 left Earth in 1977 and passed by Jupiter and Saturn. Then he took the course out of the solar system and has moved away from the Earth at a distance of six times the orbit of Neptune, the outermost planet, about 19,000 million miles from the Sun now is “in the gulf of interstellar space “, says Richard A. Kerr in Science. And apparently has been a year outside the sphere of influence of the sun, because crossed the border in August last year. The news now is that, after many debates about whether or not the Voyager 1 came or not the heliosphere called a year ago, new data received from the probe and the analysis of past records of the mission show that indeed, as announced, was when this NASA spacecraft left the bubble of charged particles, hot, surrounding the solar system and into the cold, dark environment of interstellar space, explains Science . “It is the first man-made obje ct that has officially gone into interstellar space,” NASA announced.

heliosphere boundary is not treated as a barrier limit perfectly delimited space and located in the vessel at a given time passes. In addition, the instrument would have been decisive to say whether or not it was already broke while the Voyager 1 . So no wonder the scientific debate over whether the probe was now reaching the limit, was crossing or had passed, and successive NASA ads on your ship moving, or almost interstellar space. What is now considered definitive Donald Gurnett (University of Iowa) and his colleagues, and so is explained in his article in Science , is the electron density measured by the ship in their environment, which fits perfectly density with interstellar space predicted in theoretical models.

August 2012 abruptly changed the rain of charged particles (cosmic rays) that constantly bombard the ship when registering a fall clear of the cosmic rays that are generated within the heliopause and increased those occurring outside in Galaxy. For many mission scientists was sufficient signal announced that Voyager 1 had left the region of influence of the sun. But not all were convinced, Kerr recalls. That the ship was in the border area itself, but had left was not so clear, argued some. The convincing data would be to change the direction of the magnetic, you must change to move from the heliosphere into interstellar space, and such change has not occurred.

instrument to be able to directly measure the plasma density where the ship and determine whether this outside or inside the space solar influence, broke a while, but now researchers explain that they have won three different measurements that indicate all key density change and therefore Voyager 1 is outside the heliosphere, and analyzes indicate that was the end of August 2012, so “has been sailing since one years navigating through interstellar space by the plasma (ionized gas) between the stars, “said NASA in a statement. Specifically, the ship “is crossing a transition region immediately outside the bubble of the Sun, which still appreciate some effects of the star”, experts from the U.S. space agency.

“Now that we have new key data, we believe that it is that historic leap for mankind,” said Edward Stone, senior researcher at Caltech and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (California), who was chief scientist for the Voyager mission and so far had been very cautious about declaring victory in this step of the border.

data that is taking the ship, scientists detected an increase in the pressure of interstellar space in the heliosphere in 2004 and since then have been very aware of the indicators of the output of the ship, unable to advance if take months or years. As of now, scientists are confident that instruments Voyager 1 continue to function, at least until 2020, and are looking forward to seeing what environment is finding the ship.

mission controllers still speak every day with this probe-and its twin Voyager 2, which should be out shortly it also interstellar space-but sending signals are very weak (like a refrigerator bulb, says NASA). Instruments Voyager 1 sent every day about 160 bits of data that are captured with large antennas of the Deep Space Network (DSN) that the U.S. space agency has strategically located around the world, including the Robledo de Chavela (Madrid). The total cost of the Voyager mission, with two ships, launches, and control all operations from 1977 to now amounts to 988 million dollars (741 million euros).