The Voyager team is working to keep the 42-year-old probes operational

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To conserve NASA's Voyager probes, launched 42 years ago to study giant gaseous planets in the solar system, operating as long as possible in interstellar space, mission scientists make difficult decisions to push the spaceship even further. However, achieving this goal is not easy. It is a project that forced mission managers to […]

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To keep NASA Traveler launched 42 years ago to study the giant gaseous planets of the solar system, operating in interstellar space as long as possible, mission scientists attach to the decisions to propel the spaceship even further.

However, achieving this goal is not easy. This is a case that forced mission managers to turn off certain instruments and probe thrusters to preserve food.

Both spacecraft are powered by three thermoelectric radioisotope generators (GTRs), which generate heat through the natural decay of plutonium 238 radioisotopes and convert this heat into electricity. This electricity feeds the heaters, which keep the scientific instruments and thrusters warm, allowing the two spacecraft to continue to direct their antennas to the Earth to return data.

The thermal energy produced by RTG plutonium decreases over time, both Voyagers produce about four watts less per year and operate at 40% less than in 1977. In addition, some of the spacecraft parts over 40 years old have begun to degrade.

Despite their decreasing power, spacecraft and their scientific instruments remain operational. Traveling 2 loses power faster than Traveling 1 because the first is equipped with a scientific instrument more than his companion. Both are now in the interstellar space, which Traveling 1 entered in 2012, and Traveling 2 did last year. These milestones occurred when the probes left the heliosphere, the region of space influenced by the solar wind.

Located at more than 18 billion kilometers from the Sun, the satellite studies unexplored territories, including the interaction between heliosphere and wind in interstellar space and the nature of energy and radiation in space. Understanding these phenomena is crucial for NASA for its future robotic and crew missions.

Knowing the Voyagers"As power goes down, scientists and mission engineers have developed a food management plan that will ration power by turning off certain instruments and boosters. The first action of this plan was to extinguish a heater feeding a cosmic ray subsystem (CRS) instrument on Traveling 2, which detects fast-moving particles from the Sun or beyond the solar system. Last November, this instrument provided data confirming that the probe had left the heliosphere.

Although the shutdown of the CRS heater has been stopped at minus 74 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 59 degrees Celsius), the instrument continues to operate and return the data. Scientists and engineers at the mission are pleasantly surprised to see the CRS operate in such cold temperatures, testing in 1977 having not exceeded below 49 degrees Fahrenheit (less than 45 degrees Celsius).

"It's incredible that Voyagers"The instruments have proved so robust. We are proud that they have stood the test of time. The long life of the spacecraft means we are confronted with scenarios we never imagined. We will continue to explore all the options available to us to keep the Voyagers to do the best science possible, "said Traveler Project Manager Suzanne Dodd from NASA Jet propulsion laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California.

CRS is one of the many scientific instruments operating on Traveling 2. The others include two instruments that study plasma, or ionized gas composed of positive ions and free electrons, and a magnetometer, which studies the rare clouds of materials that are sometimes found in interstellar space.

Like the CRS, Traveling 1S ultraviolet spectrometer continues to operate after having its heat off in 2012, now operating at a temperature of minus 79 degrees Celsius (minus 110 degrees Fahrenheit).

Thrusters on both Voyagers, which operate by firing tiny pulses and are used to rotate the spacecraft, degrade over time. Their role is crucial because they hold the antenna of each probe facing the Earth. In 2017, after discovering a weakening of Traveling 1The thrusters of the mission decided to power on another set of thrusters that had not been used for 37 years. When the effort paid off, the same thing was done with long unused thrusters on Traveling 2.

The data collected by both probes on the boundary between the heliosphere and interstellar space will be particularly useful to new remote observatories studying this area, such as those at NASA. Interstellar Frontier Explorer (IBEX), a small satellite launched in 2008, and its Mapping probe and interstellar acceleration (IMAP), whose launch is scheduled for 2024.

Both Voyagers should lose the power to use scientific instruments between 2025 and 2030.

Tagged: interstellar space Project Stories of Jet Propulsion Laboratory NASA's Power Management Plan: Scientific Instruments Voyagers