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Friday, September 14, 2012

The boundary of the solar system resists the Voyager 1


A study by Johns Hopkins University of Maryland (USA) completed that the probe Voyager 1, launched on September 5, 1977, is as close to the heliopause (the boundary where the solar wind disappears and begins the interstellar medium ) as scientists believed.

Voyager 1 is now in the heliosheath, the region anterior to the heliopause, where the solar wind slows and begins to show the effects of the interstellar medium.
In this transition zone is supposed that the solar plasma deviates from its southern another radial trajectory.

But since 2011, the probe Voyager 1 was reoriented periodically to measure the north-south flow, and the results show no significant meridional wind. New data suggest that, contrary to what was thought, the probe is not about to cross the frontier of the solar system.

The research, led by Robert Decker and published in Nature, suggests that our knowledge of the limits of the solar system should be reconsidered, and also notes that it may be that a new theoretical formulation of the solar wind interaction with the interstellar medium.

35 years of history

Voyager 1 is now nearly 120 astronomical units from the Sun (an astronomical unit is the distance between Earth and the Sun, about 150 million kilometers). The ship was launched as part of the Voyager Interstellar Mission, along with Voyager 2, 35 years ago.

Initially, the mission of these two probes was the exploration of Jupiter and Saturn, and after several discoveries in these planets, the project was extended. Voyager 2 also explored Uranus and Neptune, and then the two continued their journey to better understand the boundaries of the solar system.

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