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85-402: Although neither Voyager spacecraft is heading toward any particular star, Voyager 1 will pass within 1.6 light-years ' distance of the star Gliese 445 , currently in the constellation Camelopardalis , in about 40,000 years . Carl Sagan noted that "The spacecraft will be encountered and the record played only if there are advanced space-faring civilizations in interstellar space , but

170-561: A Grammy Award for best boxed or limited-edition package. The track listing is as it appears on the 2017 edition released by Ozma Records. Voyager 1 elapsed Voyager 1 is a space probe launched by NASA on September 5, 1977, as part of the Voyager program to study the outer Solar System and the interstellar space beyond the Sun's heliosphere . It was launched 16 days after its twin, Voyager 2 . It communicates through

255-460: A Grand Tour to study the outer planets led NASA to begin work on a mission during the early 1970s. Information gathered by the Pioneer 10 spacecraft helped engineers design Voyager to better cope with the intense radiation around Jupiter. Still, shortly before launch, strips of kitchen-grade aluminum foil were applied to certain cables to improve radiation shielding. Initially, Voyager 1

340-405: A choice of either doing a Pluto or Titan flyby; exploration of the moon took priority because it was known to have a substantial atmosphere. Voyager 1 studied the weather, magnetic fields , and rings of the two gas giants and was the first probe to provide detailed images of their moons. As part of the Voyager program and like its sister craft Voyager 2 , the spacecraft's extended mission

425-406: A civilization that encounters the record will be able to use the ratio of remaining uranium to the other elements to determine the age of the record. The records also had the inscription "To the makers of music – all worlds, all times" hand-etched on its surface. The inscription was located in the "takeout grooves", an area of the record between the label and playable surface. Since this was not in

510-523: A distance of 94 AU (8,700 million mi) from the Sun. On March 31, 2006, amateur radio operators from AMSAT in Germany tracked and received radio waves from Voyager 1 using the 20-metre (66 ft) dish at Bochum with a long integration technique. Retrieved data was checked and verified against data from the Deep Space Network station at Madrid, Spain. This seems to be

595-553: A greeting by Sagan's six-year-old son, Nick ; other human sounds, like footsteps and laughter (Sagan's); the inspirational message Per aspera ad astra in Morse code ; and musical selections from different cultures and eras. The record also includes a printed message from U.S. president Jimmy Carter . The collection of images includes many photographs and diagrams both in black and white, and color. The first images are of scientific interest, showing mathematical and physical quantities,

680-479: A message aboard—a kind of time capsule , intended to communicate to extraterrestrials a story of the world of humans on Earth. This is a present from a small, distant world, a token of our sounds, our science, our images, our music, our thoughts and our feelings. We are attempting to survive our time so we may live into yours. The contents of the record were selected for NASA by a committee chaired by Carl Sagan of Cornell University . The selection of content for

765-492: A new region referred to as a "cosmic purgatory". Within this stagnation region, charged particles streaming from the Sun slow and turn inward, and the Solar System's magnetic field is doubled in strength as interstellar space appears to be applying pressure. Energetic particles originating in the Solar System decline by nearly half, while the detection of high-energy electrons from outside increases 100-fold. The inner edge of

850-513: Is an improved version of the one that was used in the 1970s Viking orbiters . The Attitude and Articulation Control Subsystem (AACS) controls the spacecraft orientation (its attitude ). It keeps the high-gain antenna pointing towards the Earth , controls attitude changes, and points the scan platform. The custom-built AACS systems on both Voyagers are the same. The Voyager 1 probe was launched on September 5, 1977, from Launch Complex 41 at

935-484: Is the correct time of one rotation of the record, 3.6 seconds, expressed in time units of 0.70 billionths of a second, the time period associated with a fundamental transition of the hydrogen atom . The drawing indicates that the record should be played from the outside in. Below this drawing is a side view of the record and stylus, with a binary number giving the time to play one side of the record—about an hour (more precisely, between 53 and 54 minutes). The information in

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1020-429: Is to locate and study the regions and boundaries of the outer heliosphere and to begin exploring the interstellar medium . Voyager 1 crossed the heliopause and entered interstellar space on August 25, 2012, making it the first spacecraft to do so. Two years later, Voyager 1 began experiencing a third wave of coronal mass ejections from the Sun that continued to at least December 15, 2014, further confirming that

1105-428: Is unable to communicate with the Earth, its digital tape recorder (DTR) can record about 67 megabytes of data for later transmission. As of 2023 , signals from Voyager 1 take more than 22 hours to reach Earth. Voyager 1 has three radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs) mounted on a boom. Each MHW-RTG contains 24 pressed plutonium-238 oxide spheres. The RTGs generated about 470 W of electric power at

1190-475: The digital computers , the Flight Data Subsystem (FDS). Since the 1990s, most space probes have been equipped with completely autonomous cameras. The computer command subsystem (CCS) controls the cameras. The CCS contains fixed computer programs, such as command decoding, fault-detection and fault-correction routines, antenna pointing routines, and spacecraft sequencing routines. This computer

1275-474: The California Institute of Technology said, "Voyager has discovered a new region of the heliosphere that we had not realized was there. We're still inside, apparently. But the magnetic field now is connected to the outside. So it's like a highway letting particles in and out." The magnetic field in this region was 10 times more intense than Voyager 1 encountered before the termination shock. It

1360-535: The Cape Canaveral Air Force Station , aboard a Titan IIIE launch vehicle . The Voyager 2 probe had been launched two weeks earlier, on August 20, 1977. Despite being launched later, Voyager 1 reached both Jupiter and Saturn sooner, following a shorter trajectory. Voyager 1 ' s launch almost failed because Titan's LR-91 second stage shut down prematurely, leaving 1,200 pounds (540 kg) of propellant unburned. Recognizing

1445-523: The NASA Deep Space Network (DSN) to receive routine commands and to transmit data to Earth. Real-time distance and velocity data are provided by NASA and JPL . At a distance of 165.9  AU (24.8  billion   km ; 15.4 billion  mi ) from Earth as of November 2024 , it is the most distant human-made object from Earth. The probe made flybys of Jupiter , Saturn , and Saturn's largest moon , Titan . NASA had

1530-590: The Solar System and its planets, DNA , and human anatomy and reproduction . Care was taken to include not only pictures of humanity, but also some of animals, insects, plants and landscapes. Images of humanity depict a broad range of cultures. These images show food, architecture, and humans in portraits as well as going about their day-to-day lives. Many pictures are annotated with one or more indications of scales of time, size, or mass. Some images contain indications of chemical composition . All measures used on

1615-493: The equator . The mid-latitude auroras, which occur only in sunlit regions, remain a puzzle, since bombardment by electrons and ions, known to cause auroras on Earth, occurs primarily at high latitudes. Both Voyagers measured the rotation of Saturn (the length of a day) at 10 hours, 39 minutes, 24 seconds. Voyager 1 ' s mission included a flyby of Titan, Saturn's largest moon, which had long been known to have an atmosphere. Images taken by Pioneer 11 in 1979 had indicated

1700-565: The space beyond the Solar System as detected by the Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 space probes . According to the researchers, this implies that "the density gradient is a large-scale feature of the VLISM (very local interstellar medium ) in the general direction of the heliospheric nose ". Kesarbai Kerkar Too Many Requests If you report this error to the Wikimedia System Administrators, please include

1785-495: The termination shock in February 2003. This marks the point where the solar wind slows to subsonic speeds. Some other scientists expressed doubt and discussed this in the journal Nature of November 6, 2003. The issue would not be resolved until other data became available, since Voyager 1 's solar-wind detector ceased functioning in 1990. This failure meant that termination shock detection would have to be inferred from

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1870-406: The 35th anniversary of its launch), the date durable changes in the density of energetic particles were first detected. By this point, most space scientists had abandoned the hypothesis that a change in magnetic field direction must accompany a crossing of the heliopause; a new model of the heliopause predicted that no such change would be found. A key finding that persuaded many scientists that

1955-515: The Jovian system in April 1979. The discovery of ongoing volcanic activity on the moon Io was probably the greatest surprise. It was the first time active volcanoes had been seen on another body in the Solar System. It appears that activity on Io affects the entire Jovian system . Io appears to be the primary source of matter that pervades the Jovian magnetosphere – the region of space that surrounds

2040-418: The Solar System at 3.3 AU (310 million mi; 490 million km) per year. Each year, Voyager 1 increases its lead over Voyager 2 . Voyager 1 reached a distance of 135 AU (12.5 billion mi; 20.2 billion km) from the Sun on May 18, 2016. On September 5, 2017, that had increased to about 139.64 AU (12.980 billion mi; 20.890 billion km) from

2125-593: The Solar System, with a sharp increase in these collisions in late August. At the same time, in late August, there was a dramatic drop in collisions with low-energy particles, which are thought to originate from the Sun. Ed Roelof, space scientist at Johns Hopkins University and principal investigator for the Low-Energy Charged Particle instrument on the spacecraft, declared that "most scientists involved with Voyager 1 would agree that [these two criteria] have been sufficiently satisfied". However,

2210-399: The Sun" was not seriously considered for inclusion. In July 2015, NASA uploaded the audio contents of the record to the audio streaming service SoundCloud . In the upper left-hand corner of the record cover is a drawing of the phonograph record and the stylus carried with it. The stylus is in the correct position to play the record from the beginning. Written around it in binary notation

2295-495: The Sun, or just over 19 light-hours; at that time, Voyager 2 was 115.32 AU (10.720 billion mi; 17.252 billion km) from the Sun. Its progress can be monitored at NASA's website. On September 12, 2013, NASA officially confirmed that Voyager 1 had reached the interstellar medium in August 2012 as previously observed. The generally accepted date of arrival is August 25, 2012 (approximately 10 days before

2380-400: The Sun. The craft thus began to enter the interstellar medium at the edge of the Solar System. Voyager 1 became the first spacecraft to cross the heliopause in August 2012, then at a distance of 121 AU (1.12 × 10  mi; 1.81 × 10  km) from the Sun, although this was not confirmed for another year. As of September 2012, sunlight took 16.89 hours to get to Voyager 1 which

2465-510: The Sun. Winds blow at high speeds on Saturn. Near the equator, the Voyagers measured winds about 500 m/s (1,100 mph). The wind blows mostly in an easterly direction. The Voyagers found aurora -like ultraviolet emissions of hydrogen at mid-latitudes in the atmosphere, and auroras at polar latitudes (above 65 degrees). The high-level auroral activity may lead to the formation of complex hydrocarbon molecules that are carried toward

2550-550: The Voyager Record in the epilogue of Sagan's final book Billions and Billions (1997). To celebrate the 40th anniversary of the record, Ozma Records launched a Kickstarter project to release the record contents in LP format as part of a box set also containing a hardcover book, turntable slipmat, and art print. The Kickstarter was successfully funded with over $ 1.4 million raised. Ozma Records then produced another edition of

2635-428: The atmosphere was substantial and complex, further increasing interest. The Titan flyby occurred as the spacecraft entered the system to avoid any possibility of damage closer to Saturn compromising observations, and approached to within 6,400 km (4,000 mi), passing behind Titan as seen from Earth and the Sun. Voyager's measurement of the atmosphere's effect on sunlight and Earth-based measurement of its effect on

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2720-425: The constellation Camelopardalis , and Voyager 2 will have approached star Ross 248 , located in the constellation of Andromeda . In May 2005, it was reported that Voyager 1 had entered the heliosheath , the region beyond the termination shock. The termination shock is where the solar wind, a thin stream of electrically charged gas blowing continuously outward from the Sun, is slowed by pressure from gas between

2805-567: The constellation Ophiuchus as observed from the Earth on May 21, 2011. On December 1, 2011, it was announced that Voyager 1 had detected the first Lyman-alpha radiation originating from the Milky Way galaxy. Lyman-alpha radiation had previously been detected from other galaxies, but because of interference from the Sun, the radiation from the Milky Way was not detectable. NASA announced on December 5, 2011, that Voyager 1 had entered

2890-557: The data from the other instruments on board. In May 2005, a NASA press release said that the consensus was that Voyager 1 was then in the heliosheath . In a scientific session at the American Geophysical Union meeting in New Orleans on May 25, 2005, Ed Stone presented evidence that the craft crossed the termination shock in late 2004. This event is estimated to have occurred on December 15, 2004, at

2975-491: The deficiency, the Centaur stage's on-board computers ordered a burn that was far longer than planned in order to compensate. Centaur extended its own burn and was able to give Voyager 1 the additional velocity it needed. At cutoff, the Centaur was only 3.4 seconds from propellant exhaustion. If the same failure had occurred during Voyager 2 ' s launch a few weeks earlier, the Centaur would have run out of propellant before

3060-581: The diagram was also changed: on the Pioneer plaque, the man is waving, while on the "Vertebrate evolution" image, the woman is waving. The pulsar map and hydrogen molecule diagram are shared in common with the Pioneer plaque . The 116 images (one used for calibration) are encoded in analogue form and composed of 512 vertical lines. The remainder of the record is audio, designed to be played at 16 + 2 ⁄ 3 revolutions per minute. Jimmy Iovine , who

3145-417: The duration of one of the "picture lines", about 8 milliseconds, is noted. The drawing immediately below shows how these lines are to be drawn vertically, with staggered "interlace" to give the correct picture rendition. Immediately below this is a drawing of an entire picture raster , showing that there are 512 (2) vertical lines in a complete picture. Immediately below this is a replica of the first picture on

3230-476: The event. On this date, the spacecraft was approximately 116 AU (17.4 billion km; 10.8 billion mi) from the Sun. Voyager 1 was commanded to change its orientation to measure the sideways motion of the solar wind at that location in space in March 2011 (~33yr 6mo from launch). A test roll done in February had confirmed the spacecraft's ability to maneuver and reorient itself. The course of

3315-399: The fastest heliocentric recession speed of any spacecraft. As Voyager 1 headed for interstellar space, its instruments continued to study the Solar System. Jet Propulsion Laboratory scientists used the plasma wave experiments aboard Voyager 1 and 2 to look for the heliopause , the boundary at which the solar wind transitions into the interstellar medium . As of 2013 , the probe

3400-542: The first such amateur tracking of Voyager 1 . It was confirmed on December 13, 2010, that Voyager 1 had passed the reach of the radial outward flow of the solar wind , as measured by the Low Energy Charged Particle device. It is suspected that solar wind at this distance turns sideways because of interstellar wind pushing against the heliosphere. Since June 2010, detection of solar wind had been consistently at zero, providing conclusive evidence of

3485-532: The heliopause had been crossed was an indirect measurement of an 80-fold increase in electron density, based on the frequency of plasma oscillations observed beginning on April 9, 2013, triggered by a solar outburst that had occurred in March 2012 (electron density is expected to be two orders of magnitude higher outside the heliopause than within). Weaker sets of oscillations measured in October and November 2012 provided additional data. An indirect measurement

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3570-418: The heliosheath and entered interstellar space , although it still remains within the Sun's gravitational sphere of influence. Of the eleven instruments carried on Voyager 1 , four are still operational and continue to send back data. It is expected that at least one science instrument will remain operational through 2025 and that engineering data could be transmitted for several more years afterward. Most of

3655-413: The images used on the record (reproduced in black and white), together with information about its compilation, can be found in the 1978 book Murmurs of Earth: The Voyager Interstellar Record by Carl Sagan , F. D. Drake , Ann Druyan , Timothy Ferris , Jon Lomberg , and Linda Salzman . A CD-ROM version was issued by Warner New Media in 1992. Author Ann Druyan, who later married Carl Sagan, wrote about

3740-427: The last criterion for officially declaring that Voyager 1 had crossed the boundary, the expected change in magnetic field direction (from that of the Sun to that of the interstellar field beyond), had not been observed (the field had changed direction by only 2 degrees), which suggested to some that the nature of the edge of the heliosphere had been misjudged. On December 3, 2012, Voyager project scientist Ed Stone of

3825-478: The launching of this 'bottle' into the cosmic 'ocean' says something very hopeful about life on this planet." The Voyager 1 probe is currently the farthest human-made object from Earth . Both Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 have reached interstellar space, the region between stars where the galactic plasma is present. Like their predecessors Pioneer 10 and 11 , which featured a simple plaque , both Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 were launched by NASA with

3910-404: The lower left-hand corner of the cover is the pulsar map previously sent as part of the plaques on Pioneers 10 and 11. It shows the location of the Solar System with respect to 14 pulsars , whose precise periods are given. The drawing containing two circles in the lower right-hand corner is a drawing of the hydrogen atom in its two lowest states, with a connecting line and digit 1 to indicate that

3995-412: The new region was interstellar space or an unknown region of the Solar System. At that time, the former alternative was officially confirmed. In 2013 Voyager 1 was exiting the Solar System at a speed of about 3.6 AU (330 million mi; 540 million km) per year, which is 61,602 km/h, 4.83 times the diameter of Earth (12,742 km) per hour; whereas Voyager 2 is going slower, leaving

4080-450: The nudity on the Pioneer plaque (line drawings of a naked man and woman), the agency chose not to allow Sagan and his colleagues to include a photograph of a nude man and woman on the record. Instead, only a silhouette of the couple was included. However, the record does contain "Diagram of vertebrate evolution", by Jon Lomberg , with drawings of an anatomically correct naked male and naked female, showing external organs. The person waving on

4165-661: The original specifications, the record was initially rejected, to be replaced with a blank disc. Sagan later convinced the administrator to include the record as is. Voyager 1 was launched in 1977, passed the orbit of Pluto in 1990, and left the Solar System (in the sense of passing the termination shock ) in November 2004. It is now in the Kuiper belt . In about 40,000 years, it and Voyager 2 will each come to within about 1.8 light-years of two separate stars: Voyager 1 will have approached star Gliese 445 , located in

4250-704: The pictures are defined in the first few images using physical references that are likely to be consistent anywhere in the universe . The musical selection is also varied, featuring works by composers such as J.S. Bach (interpreted by Glenn Gould ), Mozart , Beethoven (played by the Budapest String Quartet ), and Stravinsky . The disc also includes music by Guan Pinghu , Blind Willie Johnson , Chuck Berry , Kesarbai Kerkar , Valya Balkanska , and electronic composer Laurie Spiegel , as well as Azerbaijani folk music ( Mugham ) by oboe player Kamil Jalilov . The inclusion of Berry's " Johnny B. Goode "

4335-541: The planet influenced by the planet's strong magnetic field . Sulfur , oxygen , and sodium , apparently erupted by Io's volcanoes and sputtered off the surface by the impact of high-energy particles, were detected at the outer edge of the magnetosphere of Jupiter . The two Voyager space probes made a number of important discoveries about Jupiter, its satellites, its radiation belts, and its never-before-seen planetary rings . The gravitational assist trajectories at Jupiter were successfully carried out by both Voyagers, and

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4420-589: The probe is in interstellar space. In 2017, the Voyager team successfully fired the spacecraft's trajectory correction maneuver (TCM) thrusters for the first time since 1980, enabling the mission to be extended by two to three years. Voyager 1 ' s extended mission is expected to continue to return scientific data until at least 2025, with a maximum lifespan of until 2030. Its radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs) may supply enough electric power to return engineering data until 2036. A 1960s proposal for

4505-619: The probe reached the correct trajectory. Jupiter was in a more favorable position vis-à-vis Earth during the launch of Voyager 1 than during the launch of Voyager 2 . Voyager 1 's initial orbit had an aphelion of 8.9 AU (830 million mi), just a little short of Saturn's orbit of 9.5 AU (880 million mi). Voyager 2 ' s initial orbit had an aphelion of 6.2 AU (580 million mi), well short of Saturn's orbit. Voyager 1 began photographing Jupiter in January 1979. Its closest approach to Jupiter

4590-460: The probe's radio antenna pointed toward Earth . Collectively, these instruments are part of the Attitude and Articulation Control Subsystem (AACS), along with redundant units of most instruments and eight backup thrusters. The spacecraft also included 11 scientific instruments to study celestial objects such as planets as it travels through space. The radio communication system of Voyager 1

4675-462: The probe's radio signal were used to determine the atmosphere's composition, density, and pressure. Titan's mass was also measured by observing its effect on the probe's trajectory. The thick haze prevented any visual observation of the surface, but the measurement of the atmosphere's composition, temperature, and pressure led to speculation that lakes of liquid hydrocarbons could exist on the surface. Because observations of Titan were considered vital,

4760-452: The record to permit the recipients to verify that they are decoding the signals correctly. A circle was used in this picture to ensure that the recipients use the correct ratio of horizontal to vertical height in picture reconstruction. Color images were represented by three images in sequence, one each for red, green, and blue components of the image. A color image of the spectrum of the sun was included for calibration purposes. The drawing in

4845-490: The record took almost a year. Sagan and his associates assembled 116 images (one used for calibration) and a variety of natural sounds, such as those made by surf, wind, thunder and animals (including the songs of birds and whales ). To this they added audio content to represent humanity: spoken greetings in 55 ancient and modern languages, including a spoken greeting in English by U.N. Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim and

4930-412: The records were plated they were mounted in aluminum containers and delivered to JPL. The record is a copper disk 12 inches (30 cm) in diameter plated first with nickel and then gold. The record's cover is aluminum and electroplated upon it is an ultra-pure sample of the isotope uranium-238 . Uranium-238 has a half-life of 4.468 billion years. It is possible (e.g., via mass spectrometry ) that

5015-541: The song is cited as one of the legal challenges faced by the team compiling the Voyager Golden Record. In the book, Sagan said that the Beatles favoured the idea, but "[they] did not own the copyright, and the legal status of the piece seemed too murky to risk." When asked about the obstacle presented by EMI with regard to "Here Comes the Sun", despite the artists' wishes, Ann Druyan said in 2015: "Yeah, that

5100-475: The sounds of humpbacked whales from the 1970 album by Roger Payne , Songs of the Humpback Whale . The Golden Record also carries an hour-long recording of the brainwaves of Ann Druyan. During the recording of the brainwaves, Druyan thought of many topics, including Earth's history, civilizations and the problems they face, and what it was like to fall in love. After NASA had received criticism over

5185-511: The spacecraft was not changed. It rotated 70 degrees counterclockwise with respect to Earth to detect the solar wind. This was the first time the spacecraft had done any major maneuvering since the Family Portrait photograph of the planets was taken in 1990. After the first roll the spacecraft had no problem in reorienting itself with Alpha Centauri , Voyager 1 's guide star, and it resumed sending transmissions back to Earth. Voyager 1

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5270-522: The spacecraft was traveling in the direction of that star, it would take 73,775 years to reach it. ( Voyager 1 is heading in the direction of the constellation Ophiuchus .) In late 2012, researchers reported that particle data from the spacecraft suggested that the probe had passed through the heliopause. Measurements from the spacecraft revealed a steady rise since May in collisions with high energy particles (above 70 MeV), which are thought to be cosmic rays emanating from supernova explosions far beyond

5355-421: The spacecraft, so it would now be complex to get them working again. Earth-side software and computers for reading the images are also no longer available. On February 17, 1998, Voyager 1 reached a distance of 69 AU (6.4 billion mi; 10.3 billion km) from the Sun and overtook Pioneer 10 as the most distant spacecraft from Earth. Traveling at about 17 km/s (11 mi/s), it has

5440-457: The stagnation region is located approximately 113 AU from the Sun. NASA announced in June 2012 that the probe was detecting changes in the environment that were suspected to correlate with arrival at the heliopause . Voyager 1 had reported a marked increase in its detection of charged particles from interstellar space, which are normally deflected by the solar winds within the heliosphere from

5525-537: The stars. At the termination shock, the solar wind slows abruptly from its average speed of 300–700 km/s (670,000–1,570,000 mph) and becomes denser and hotter. In March 2012, Voyager 1 was over 17.9 billion km from the Sun and traveling at a speed of 3.6 AU per year (approximately 61,000 km/h (38,000 mph)), while Voyager 2 was over 14.7 billion km away and moving at about 3.3 AU per year (approximately 56,000 km/h (35,000 mph)). On September 12, 2013, NASA announced that Voyager 1 had left

5610-488: The three-disc LP vinyl record box set that also includes the audio content of the Golden Record, softcover book containing the images encoded on the record, images sent back by Voyager , commentary from Ferris, art print, turntable slipmat, and a collector's box. This edition was released in February 2018 along with a 2xCD-Book edition. In January 2018, Ozma Records' "Voyager Golden Record; 40th Anniversary Edition" won

5695-781: The time interval associated with the transition from one state to the other is to be used as the fundamental time scale, both for the time given on the cover and in the decoded pictures. Blank records were provided by the Pyral S.A. of Créteil , France. CBS Records contracted the JVC Cutting Center in Boulder, Colorado to cut the lacquer masters which were then sent to the James G. Lee record-processing center in Gardena, California to cut and gold-plate eight Voyager records. After

5780-509: The time of launch, with the remainder being dissipated as waste heat. The power output of the RTGs declines over time due to the 87.7-year half-life of the fuel and degradation of the thermocouples, but they will continue to support some of its operations until at least 2025. Unlike Voyager's other instruments, the operation of the cameras for visible light is not autonomous, but is controlled by an imaging parameter table contained in one of

5865-468: The trajectory chosen for Voyager 1 was designed around the optimum Titan flyby, which took it below the south pole of Saturn and out of the plane of the ecliptic , ending its planetary science mission. Had Voyager 1 failed or been unable to observe Titan, Voyager 2 's trajectory would have been altered to incorporate the Titan flyby, precluding any visit to Uranus and Neptune. The trajectory Voyager 1

5950-497: The two spacecraft went on to visit Saturn and its system of moons and rings. Voyager 1 encountered Saturn in November 1980, with the closest approach on November 12, 1980, when the space probe came within 124,000 kilometres (77,000 mi) of Saturn's cloud-tops. The space probe's cameras detected complex structures in the rings of Saturn , and its remote sensing instruments studied the atmospheres of Saturn and its giant moon Titan . Voyager 1 found that about seven percent of

6035-442: The upper right-hand portion of the cover is designed to show how pictures are to be constructed from the recorded signals. The top drawing shows the typical signal that occurs at the start of a picture. The picture is made from this signal, which traces the picture as a series of vertical lines, similar to analog television (in which the picture is a series of horizontal lines). Picture lines 1, 2 and 3 are noted in binary numbers, and

6120-456: The vastly larger region of space populated by bodies that orbit the Sun. The craft is presently less than one-seventh the distance to the aphelion of Sedna , and it has not yet entered the Oort cloud , the source region of long-period comets , regarded by astronomers as the outermost zone of the Solar System. In October 2020, astronomers reported a significant unexpected increase in density in

6205-463: The volume of Saturn's upper atmosphere is helium (compared with 11 percent of Jupiter's atmosphere), while almost all the rest is hydrogen . Since Saturn's internal helium abundance was expected to be the same as Jupiter's and the Sun's, the lower abundance of helium in the upper atmosphere may imply that the heavier helium may be slowly sinking through Saturn's hydrogen; that might explain the excess heat that Saturn radiates over energy it receives from

6290-446: Was at a distance of 121 AU. The apparent magnitude of the Sun from the spacecraft was −16.3 (about 30 times brighter than the full Moon). The spacecraft was traveling at 17.043 km/s (10.590 mi/s) relative to the Sun. At this rate, it would need about 17,565 years at this speed to travel a single light-year . To compare, Proxima Centauri , the closest star to the Sun, is about 4.2 light-years ( 2.65 × 10  AU ) distant. If

6375-480: Was controversial, with some claiming that rock music was "adolescent", to which Sagan replied, "There are a lot of adolescents on the planet." The selection of music for the record was completed by a team composed of Carl Sagan as project director, Linda Salzman Sagan , Frank Drake , Alan Lomax , Ann Druyan as creative director, artist Jon Lomberg , ethnomusicologist Robert E. Brown , Timothy Ferris as producer, and Jimmy Iovine as sound engineer. It also included

6460-530: Was designed to be used up to and beyond the limits of the Solar System . It has a 3.7-metre (12 ft) diameter high-gain Cassegrain antenna to send and receive radio waves via the three Deep Space Network stations on the Earth. The spacecraft normally transmits data to Earth over Deep Space Network Channel 18, using a frequency of either 2.3 GHz or 8.4 GHz, while signals from Earth to Voyager are transmitted at 2.1 GHz. When Voyager 1

6545-403: Was expected to be the last barrier before the spacecraft exited the Solar System completely and entered interstellar space. In March 2013, it was announced that Voyager 1 might have become the first spacecraft to enter interstellar space, having detected a marked change in the plasma environment on August 25, 2012. However, until September 12, 2013, it was still an open question as to whether

6630-427: Was expected to enter interstellar space "at any time". Voyager 2 was still detecting outward flow of solar wind at that point but it was estimated that in the following months or years it would experience the same conditions as Voyager 1 . The spacecraft was reported at 12.44° declination and 17.163 hours right ascension, and at an ecliptic latitude of 34.9° (the ecliptic latitude changes very slowly), placing it in

6715-521: Was launched into would not have allowed it to continue on to Uranus and Neptune, but could have been altered to avoid a Titan flyby and travel from Saturn to Pluto , arriving in 1986. On February 14, 1990, Voyager 1 took the first " family portrait " of the Solar System as seen from outside, which includes the image of planet Earth known as Pale Blue Dot . Soon afterward, its cameras were deactivated to conserve energy and computer resources for other equipment. The camera software has been removed from

6800-515: Was moving with a relative velocity to the Sun of about 61,197 kilometres per hour (38,026 mph). With the velocity the probe is currently maintaining, Voyager 1 is traveling about 523 million km (325 million mi) per year, or about one light-year per 18,000 years. Scientists at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory believe that Voyager 1 entered

6885-403: Was on March 5, 1979, at a distance of about 349,000 kilometres (217,000 miles) from the planet's center. Because of the greater photographic resolution allowed by a closer approach, most observations of the moons, rings, magnetic fields, and the radiation belt environment of the Jovian system were made during the 48-hour period that bracketed the closest approach. Voyager 1 finished photographing

6970-460: Was one of those cases of having to see the tragedy of our planet. Here's a chance to send a piece of music into the distant future and distant time, and to give it this kind of immortality, and they're worried about money ... we got this telegram [from EMI] saying that it will be $ 50,000 per record for two records, and the entire Voyager record cost $ 18,000 to produce." However, this was denied in 2017 by Timothy Ferris ; in his recollection, "Here Comes

7055-673: Was planned as Mariner 11 of the Mariner program . Due to budget cuts, the mission was reduced to a flyby of Jupiter and Saturn and renamed the Mariner Jupiter-Saturn probes. The name was changed to Voyager when the probe designs began to differ substantially from Mariner missions. Voyager 1 was built by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). It has 16 hydrazine thrusters, three-axis stabilization gyroscopes , and referencing instruments to keep

7140-413: Was required because Voyager 1 's plasma spectrometer had stopped working in 1980. In September 2013, NASA released recordings of audio transductions of these plasma waves, the first to be measured in interstellar space. While Voyager 1 is commonly spoken of as having left the Solar System simultaneously with having left the heliosphere, the two are not the same. The Solar System is usually defined as

7225-482: Was still early in his career as a music producer, served as sound engineer for the project at the recommendation of John Lennon , who was contacted to contribute but was unable to take part. Sagan's team wanted to include the Beatles 1969 song " Here Comes the Sun " on the record, but the record company EMI , which held the copyrights, declined. In the 1978 book Murmurs of Earth , the failure to secure permission for

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