The Takeaway: Story of the Day - Where in the Solar System Is Voyager 1?

Where in the Solar System Is Voyager 1?

03/27/13 • -1 min

There was a moment last week when the scientific community was on the edge of its seat after news that NASA's Voyager 1 had left the solar system. Voyager 1 is one of two spacecraft sent into the far reaches of the cosmos in the late 1970s to tour the solar system and collect data. Last week, a new study alleged that Voyager 1 had burst through the heliosphere into interstellar space. NASA quickly shot down that explanation.

"Voyager 1 is about 18 billion kilometers, or 11 billion miles, from the sun," said project scientist Edward Stone of NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena. "It's on the very edge of the bubble the sun creates around itself, called the heliosphere." In other words, the craft remains well within the confines of the solar system, according to NASA.

But the study has sparked a debate over how exactly we know where the solar system ends and interstellar space begins. It's also brought the Voyager mission back into the limelight.

According to Stone, on August 25th, there was a major change in the environment surrounding Voyager, causing some to think it had moved outside of the bubble for the first time. "For 7 years, we’d seen a very intense field of radiation, which essentially disappeared on August 25th, suggesting that we might actually be outside the bubble for the first time. But it turns out that the magnetic field, once we measured it, was exactly the same as it had been...so we knew we were still inside the bubble but now connected to the outside for the first time."

Stone describes this change as a nice achievement. "It’s really almost a perfect vacuum as far as the spacecraft is concerned. Inside the bubble, we are surrounded by the magnetic field and the material that has come from the atmosphere of the sun. Outside, we will be embedded in the magnetic field of the galaxy and in material that has come from the explosion of supernova nearby, 5, 10, 15 million years ago."

"We listen to Voyager 1 about 8-10 hours every day. It’s sending back data on what is the magnet field, how many cosmic ray particles are out there...that’s the kind of data we're sending back every day."

Our Washington correspondent, Todd Zwillich, is filling in as host all this week. Follow Todd on Twitter for the latest from Capitol Hill.

Follow Todd for the latest from Washington // <![CDATA[ !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js";fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); // ]]>

But the study has sparked a debate over how exactly we know where the solar system ends and interstellar space begins. It's also brought the Voyager mission back into the limelight.

Our Washington correspondent, Todd Zwillich, is filling in as host all this week. Follow Todd on Twitter for the latest from Capitol Hill.

Previous Episode

Same-Sex Marriage Goes to the Supreme Court

Today the Supreme Court hears the first of two cases on the constitutionality of gay marriage.

The first case is Hollingsworth v. Perry, a challenge to California’s Proposition 8, the voter-approved, state constitutional amendment that banned same-sex marriage back in 2008. On Wednesday, the nation's highest court will hear United States v. Windsor, the case that will determine the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act (also known as DOMA), signed into law by President Clinton in 1996.

Kenji Yoshino, professor of constitutional law at New York University School of Law, explains that there are a few potential outcomes if the Supreme Court decides to strike down Proposition 8. The Court could decide that all state bans on same-sex marriage are unconstitutional but, Yoshino says, that seems unlikely.

"I think that the Supreme Court will rule for the plaintiffs, but on...intermediate grounds," Yoshino says. In other words, Yoshino believes that the Court is more likely to rule one of three ways:

That the defendants do not have standing to bring the case, which would kick the case back to the district level and allow the district ruling (in which Judge Vaughn Walker ruled for the California plaintiffs) to stand.

That it was unconstitutional for California to grant a right (the state Supreme Court approved gay marriage in May 2008), then take it away (via the Proposition 8).

That the nine states that allow same-sex domestic partnerships or civil unions must allow gay marriage (in addition the the nine states that already do allow gay marriage.

Yoshino predicts the Supreme Court will strike down the Defense of Marriage Act. "The reason that [DOMA] is more vulnerable than Proposition 8," Yoshino says, "is because marriage has traditionally been an issue of state law, rather than federal law. So the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act is really a usurpation of the traditional relationship between the federal and state governments on the side of the federal government."

Yoshino points out that the Federal government under President Obama has taken a complicated approach to the Defense of Marriage Act: "They are enforcing [DOMA] but they are refusing to defend it. And I want to make clear, that this is very rare but it is not unprecedented."

Because the federal government has refused to defend it, House Republicans led by John Boehner have stepped in to do just that. "Obama is not saying that the Supreme Court shouldn’t decide this case, he’s just saying that he wouldn't defend it. And in fact Chief Roberts himself declined to defend in an affirmative action case and so this is something that occurs on both sides of the aisle."

Listen to audio from today's same-sex marriage hearings at the Supreme Court

Our Washington correspondent, Todd Zwillich, is filling in as host all this week. Follow Todd on Twitter for the latest from Capitol Hill.

Next Episode

Samsung Pushes Colossal Development in South Korea

As the North Korea's leader Kim Jong-Un continues to exercise his power, South Korea is pushing forward on another, business-related front. The country is home to the world's largest smartphone maker, and its influential economic leader, Lee Kun-Hee.

Lee Kun Hee may not be a household name in the United States, at least in comparison to his former Apple contender Steve Jobs, however, his influence is felt at Apple, Sony and without a doubt, in the homes of many Americans.

Over 75 years of business, Samsung is privy to the tactics needed to stay relevant while keeping competitors on their toes. For example, recent ads by the company mock Apple fans waiting in line to buy the iPhone, portraying them as old and outdated.

Sam Grobart, senior writer at Bloomberg Businessweek, explores the rise of the business in his latest piece and weighs the effects of Samsung as a company, and looks at the corporate practices that keeps it a competent contender in the race of greatest electronics.

Sam Grobart, senior writer at Bloomberg Businessweek (Alex Johnson/WNYC)