Forging the Future of Space Science The Next 50 Years (2010) / Chapter Skim
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Voyager's Journey to the Edge of Interstellar Space--Edward C. Stone
Voyager's Journey to the Edge of Interstellar Space--Edward C. Stone
Pages 109-117
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From page 109... ...
the edge of the heliospheric bubble, a termination Although its density is much lower than the best shock marks where the supersonic wind abruptly slows laboratory vacuum, the solar wind is strong enough to to subsonic speeds, forming a thick layer called the create the heliosphere, a giant bubble around the Sun heliosheath. In this outermost layer of the heliosphere, that envelops the planets (Figure 7.1)
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From page 110... ...
exploring the heliosheath on their way to interstellar space. THE VOYAGER MISSION Voyager's primary mission was to study the giant outer planets.
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From page 111... ...
Jupiter, Io, and Europa With the success of Voyager 1, Voyager 2 remained in the planetary plane during its Saturn flyby, continu- Jupiter's Great Red Spot, a giant counterclockwise ing on to Uranus and Neptune. A flyby over Neptune's rotating storm system nearly three Earth diameters north pole deflected Voyager 2 southward for a close across, is the largest of dozens of storm systems conflyby of the moon Triton.
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From page 112... ...
The lower four are the giant outer planets, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune (not to scale)
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From page 113... ...
Evidence in the solar system, resembles a floating ice pack, with of such an ocean was found by the Galileo spacecraft faint streaks marking where tidal flexing has cracked in its close flybys of Europa during its mission in orbit the surface (Figure 7.6)
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From page 114... ...
The outermost A-ring, the brighter B-ring, and FIGURE 7.8 Saturn's moon Enceladus. The grooves, faults, and the fainter inner C-ring are composed of countless icy fragments with ripples and gaps due to moons orbiting nearby.
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From page 115... ...
there was a Dark Spot that resembled Jupiter's Greater Because of the opaque haze, Voyager could not Red Spot. However, a few years later the Hubble Space image Titan's surface, but in 2005 the Huygens probe Telescope found that the Dark Spot had disappeared carried by Cassini parachuted down to Titan's sur- and other spots have since appeared.
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From page 116... ...
The coldest body Voy entered the heliosphere as neutral interstellar atoms and ager 2 observed has a polar cap of frozen nitrogen marked by dark streaks of dust deposited by plumes of geysers erupting were subsequently ionized. from its surface.
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From page 117... ...
It was predicted that some of the interstellar ions stellar space by 2015. Surrounded for the first time by would bounce back and forth like cosmic ping pong matter from other stars, it will measure the direction balls between the magnetic fields on opposite sides of and strength of the local interstellar magnetic field the shock, becoming low energy cosmic rays as they draped around the heliosphere and the intensity of low slowly gained speeds up to half the speed of light.
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