The probe, which has long crossed the boundaries of the Solar System, detected a constant hum of interstellar gas. Voyager 1 is one of the most distant man-made objects and, above all, it still works
44 years have passed since NASA’s two Voyager probes. Decades later, Voyager 1 continues to send us precious data, especially now that it has crossed borders of interstellar space. What is most surprising is that the probe still works. His instruments, in recent days, have picked up a constant hum of interstellar gaswhat astronomers call the “plasma frequency.” In practice it is an oscillation (or more) of the electronic density in conducting media, such as metals, in the ultraviolet radiation band.
The new data transmitted by the NASA probe
As you can imaginethe data that the probe is transmitting to us from beyond the borders of the Solar System uses long time to get to Earth. Ben Approximately 14 billion kilometers distance separate Voyager 1 from our planet. Well, it was the doctor Stella Koch Ochera Cornell doctoral student in astronomy, to clarify the discovery. He said the probe would have detected, thanks to its instruments, a “faint and persistent hum of interstellar gas”. And he added that such hum would be “weak and monotonous, precisely because it is in a very narrow frequency bandwidth.” This new discovery is allowing scientists to understand how it interacts with solar winds, and how the heliosphere (i.e. the so-called protective bubble that surrounds our Solar System) is shaped and modified by an environment completely unknown to us.
What do we know about the “hum” detected by the Voyager 1 probe in interstellar space
Launched in September 1977, NASA’s Voyager 1 probe first flew to Jupiter (1979) and then headed for Saturn (1980). The probe travels at about 38,000 miles per hour and crossed the edge of the Solar System in August 2012. His communication speed has decreased from 160 bits per second to about half that. After entering, the probe’s plasma wave detection system picked up disturbances in the gas. Among those eruptions, caused largely by our Sun, the researchers found a constant and persistent sound.
We have to imagine the interstellar medium like a quiet and delicate drizzle. When solar flares occur it is how to detect a burst of lightning during a thunderstorm. Then the rain returns light. Ocker believes there is more low-level activity in the interstellar gas than astronomers previously thought. This will allow researchers and scientists to track , when undisturbed by .
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