The Voyager 1 spacecraft is a 722-kilogram (1,592 lb) robotic space probe of the outer Solar System and beyond, launched September 5, 1977.Here's a few:
Current activities
Voyager 1 is currently the farthest human-made object from Earth, traveling away from both the Earth and the Sun at a speed that corresponds to a greater specific energy than any other probe.
As of August 28, 2009, Voyager 1 was about 110.94 AU (16.596 billion km, or 10.312 billion miles) from the Sun, and has passed the termination shock, entering the heliosheath, with the current goal of reaching and studying the heliopause, which is the known boundary of the solar system.
If Voyager 1 is still functioning when it finally completes the passage through the heliopause (effectively becoming the first human-made object to leave the solar system), scientists will get their first direct measurements of the conditions in the interstellar medium, which may provide clues relevant to the origin and overall nature of the Universe.
At this distance, signals from Voyager 1 have a Round Trip Light Time of 30:53:20 (hh:mm:ss) -- versus 24:56:14 for Voyager 2 (as of 2009-09-25).
Voyager 1 is on a hyperbolic trajectory and has achieved escape velocity, meaning that its orbit will not return to the inner solar system.
Along with Pioneer 10, Pioneer 11, Voyager 2, and the New Horizons, Voyager 1 is an interstellar probe. If Voyager 1 were traveling in the direction of the nearest star, it would arrive in about 75,000 years.
Both of the Voyager space probes have long outlasted their originally planned lifespan. Each space probe gets its electrical power from three radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs), which are expected to continue to generate enough electric power to let the probes keep communicating with Earth at least until the year 2025.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voyager_1
There's so much trivia around the Voyager mission that you would need something as vast as another Voyager mission to find it all out ( PJ of the Day)!
1. Voyager Golden record:
You're sending a space probe right? Beyond the boundaries crossed by any man-made object ever, right? What if it's intercepted by an alien civilization? So thought the scientists of the day and included what is known as the "Voyager Golden Record", an LP containing samplings of music from all over the world.
Here's what India sent:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ek7NKH5mTgs
2. Symphonies of Planets
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GdYMPk_DXow
I had read, as a child, how the Rishis deciphered the sound for the purest sound in Hindu mythology: 'Om'. It is said that Omkara is the basic sound that pervades all of 'Aakasha' (space).
This formed a clear contradiction for me who grew up to learn Space is vacuum and incapable of sound propagation (remeber the gaffe aboard Apollo due to which only two men aboard the mission walked on Moon)
Here NASA has deciphered some of the weak EM radiation that Voyager probes picked up when they were drifting near the planets Jupiter and Saturn which was otherwise unobserved. Somehow, this trivia fascinates me. Just to think, somehow, our previous generations possibly had access to technology comparable to the current one which could perhaps be attributed to the "Great Contact".
These might just be implausible considering the number of mappings of EM radiation to Auditory frequencies, the measurement noise that might have crept in and so on.
It sounds interesting and worthy of further exploration. I plan to post a detailed analysis if and when I get to it.
Your last point was very interesting. I really appreciated it very much :). Keep the good thoughts rolling :) BTW that song Jaat kahan ho was brilliant.
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