Nasa’s Voyager 2 probe ‘leaves the Solar System’

Nasa’s Voyager 2 probe ‘leaves the Solar System’

News:

NASA Voyager 2 probe approaches interstellar space

Facts:

About Voyager Probe

• The probe is only the second human-built object to leave the bubble of solar particles that emanates from our sun.
• Voyager 1 departed Earth on 5 September 1977, a few days after its sister spacecraft, Voyager 2
• The Voyagers were sent initially to study the outer planets, but then just kept on going.
• The pair’s primary objective was to survey the planets Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune which completed in 1989.
• Voyager 2 will provide “first-of-its-kind observations of the nature of this gateway into interstellar space.
• Voyager 2 remains the only craft ever to visit Uranus and Neptune and Voyager second craft to cross the heliopause.

Additional Facts

• Interstellar space is filled with cosmic rays, rather than plasma from our sun.
• Scientists define the edge of the solar system as past the outer edge of the Oort cloud.
• The Oort cloud is made up of icy bodies that can be as large as mountains and is the origin of some comets. Unlike planets, which are orbiting in a flat plane, the Oort cloud is a bubble around the solar system.
• Heliopause – Heliopause is the boundary of the heliosphere which is the spherical region around the Sun. It is filled with solar magnetic fields and solar wind that consists of protons and electrons. The Heliosheath lies closer to the Sun than the heliosphere and it is a region of transition where the wind is at subsonic speed