For the second time in its history, the space probe has entered interstellar space

For the second time in its history, a man-made object has reached interstellar space, according to NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration of the United States) .

The Voyager 2 spacecraft has passed the heliosphere, the protective envelope of particles and magnetic fields formed by the Sun. Its twin Voyager 1 probes reached this limit in 2012, but the Voyager 2 is equipped with devices that will transmit the first data of this type on the nature of this entry into interstellar space, according to scientists.

According to NASA, the Voyager 2 is now at a distance of about 18 billion kilometers from the Earth. The mission members are still in contact with him, but it takes 16.5 hours for the signal to cross the path from the probe to Earth. For comparison: sunlight reaches the Earth for eight minutes

The strongest evidence that Voyager 2 exceeds the heliosphere, scientists call the data obtained with the tool called "Plasma Science Experiment", which stopped working with Voyager 1 in 1980.

Until recently, the space around Voyager 2 was filled with plasma, whose source is the Sun. The flow of this plasma is called the solar wind and forms a heliosphere. The PLS tool calculates the plasma content to determine the speed, density, temperature and pressure of the solar wind.

According to the company, on November 5, the PLS instrument aboard Voyager 2 recorded a sharp decrease in solar wind speed. Since then, the plasma flow around the probe has no longer been corrected, which allowed scientists to ensure that it had entered an interstellar space.

Read also: NASA has published for the first time a recording of the Martian wind

"We Eda Stone, Voyager project scientist based at Pasadena Institute of Technology in California, at NASA, still has much to learn about the region of interstellar space just outside the heliopause (the outer layer of the heliosphere is edited).

Voyager 2 Probe was launched in 1977, 16 days earlier than Voyager 1. Both probes traveled a much longer distance than originally planned.The spacecraft was expected to operate for five years and explore Jupiter and Saturn closely. , it would prove that they could also help in the study of Uranus and Neptune. While the probes roamed the solar system, the researchers, through reprogramming, made the two Voyager more powerful than they do Were at the moment of their launch from Earth. Thus, the five-year mission lasted 41 years. The Voyager 2 flight is now the longest mission of NASA.