NASA’s Voyager 1 Resumes Sending Science Data from Beyond Our Solar System

Voyager 1, NASA’s farthest spacecraft from Earth, has resumed sending science data after a computer problem in November. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory announced this week that Voyager 1’s four instruments are back in operation. The team recently received meaningful information from Voyager 1 in April and has now commanded it to start studying its environment again.

Launched in 1977, Voyager 1 is currently drifting through interstellar space, which is the space between star systems. Prior to reaching this region, the spacecraft made important discoveries such as finding a thin ring around Jupiter and studying several of Saturn’s moons. Its instruments are specifically designed to collect data on plasma waves, magnetic fields, and particles.

Currently, Voyager 1 is over 15 billion miles from Earth, while its twin Voyager 2 is also in interstellar space and located more than 12 billion miles away. Both spacecraft are continuing their missions to explore and study the vast expanse of space beyond our solar system.