The legacy of the Voyager mission

• NASA recently detected a “heartbeat” signal from the spacecraft, Voyager 2, after losing the communication with it.

Voyager 2

• It is Earth’s longest-running space probe which was launched in 1977.
• Voyager 2 is the second spacecraft to enter the interstellar space
  • The region that lies outside the impact of our Sun’s constant flow of material and magnetic field.
• The first was Voyager 1, sent to space about two weeks after Voyager 2.
• Significance
  • Explored all the outer giant planets of our solar system
  • Discovered over 40 moons and numerous rings.
  • Provided invaluable data on planetary astronomy
  • Inspired many future space missions.

Why were the Voyager spacecraft sent into space?

• Initially, it was proposed to explore only Jupiter and Saturn.
• After making a string of discoveries, the mission was extended.
• Voyager 2 went on to explore Uranus and Neptune, and is still the only spacecraft to have visited those outer planets.
• The adventurers' current mission, the Voyager Interstellar Mission (VIM), will explore the outermost edge of the Sun's domain.

Features of the Voyager spacecraft

• Each of the spacecraft is equipped with instruments to carry out 10 different experiments.
  • The instruments include television cameras, infrared and ultraviolet sensors, magnetometers, plasma detectors, and cosmic-ray and charged-particle sensors.
• Both spacecraft feature a large antenna, 3.7 metres in diameter, which is used to receive commands from Earth and radio their findings back to the planet.
• It relies on a small nuclear power plant, drawing hundreds of watts from the radioactive decay of a pellet of plutonium.
  • As their mission involved going far away from the Sun, they aren’t powered by solar power, like other spacecraft are.
• Each Voyager spacecraft is adorned with a golden phonograph record intended to be a sort of time capsule from Earth to any extraterrestrial life that might intercept the probes in the distant future.

Achievements of the Spacecrafts

• Voyager 1
  • Finding that Io, one of Jupiter’s moons, was geologically active.
  • It noted the presence of at least eight active volcanoes “spewing material into space, making it one of the most geologically active planetary bodies in the solar system.
  • While passing by the moon Titan, it discovered that it wasn’t the biggest moon of our solar system, contrary to what scientists of the time believed
  • It also noted that Titan’s atmosphere was composed of 90 percent nitrogen, and it likely had clouds and rain of methane.
• Voyager 2
  • It confirmed that the main constituents of Uranus are hydrogen and helium.
  • It also discovered 10 new moons and two new rings in addition to the previously-known nine rings, among other significant findings.
  • It discovered that Neptune is more active than previously thought.
  • It also observed the Great Dark Spot, which was essentially a huge spinning storm in the southern atmosphere of Neptune.
• Moreover, Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 discovered three new moons of Jupiter: Thebe, Metis and Adrastea.