Voyager 1 leaves the Solar System

An artist’s impression of NASA’s Voyager 1 space probe passing behind the rings of Saturn The Voyager 1 spacecraft has become the first man-made object to leave the solar system. The probe was launched 36 years ago and has spent years hurtling away from the sun. Now a new analysis has revealed that the craft crossed into interstellar space in August last year.

Voyager 1 was launched into space in 1977 to study the planets beyond our own. But after passing them one by one, it just kept on^(a) going. And now scientists believe the probe left the edge of our solar system on the 25th August last year. It crossed a region known as the heliopause, where particles thrown out from the sun pile up against the matter and magnetic fields from other stars. Now, at nearly^(b) 12 billion miles from earth, it’s in interstellar space - a cold, dark part of the Milky Way filled with gas and dust. Ed Stone , the Voyager’s chief^(c) scientist says: “This is one of those journeys of exploration, like circumnavigating the globe for the first time, or having a footprint^(d) on the moon for the first time. This is the first time we have been exploring now, this new region of space, interstellar space.”

As Voyager 1 ventures into the unknown it will send data back to NASA. Eventually though, it will fall silent — its power supply is expected to run out^(e) in the next 10 years. But if the probe is ever happened upon by extraterrestrial beings as it floats through space they’ll find a record containing pictures and messages.

VOYAGER 1 leaves the Solar System. Disponível em: <www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/language/wordsinthenews/2013/09/130913_witn_voyager_story.shtml>. Acesso em: 2 fev. 2014

“probe”: sonda.