The Ulysses legacy

A podcast by ESA regarding the Ulysses mission coming to an end. Date- 10th June 08. Source- http://www.esa.int/esa-mmg/mmghome.pl

'The Ulysses mission has made fundamental contributions to our understanding of the Sun, its surroundings and our local interstellar neighbourhood.

For more than 17 years, the joint ESA/NASA mission Ulysses studied the heliosphere (the sphere of influence of the Sun) and our local interstellar neighbourhood, providing the first-ever map of the heliosphere in the four dimensions of space and time.

Ulysses was designed to last for five years but it is still returning valuable data. The mission, which takes the spacecraft over the poles of the Sun, was extended four times, allowing Ulysses to pass over the Sun's poles for a second and third time.

But like all good things, the mission is coming to an end.'

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• ulysses
• satellite
• sun
• poles
• solar
• wind
• cosmic
• rays
• heliosphere

[ActiveStorage]

retractable solar panels maybe?

[ActiveStorage]

yeah we need more solar missions.

[ActiveStorage]

stars and planets are the same entities.

the only difference is the amount of energy (charged particles) going though the poles (aka auroras) The extremely high energies at the solar poles cause its atmosphere to behave the way it does.

google plasma universe

[rollsthepaul]

This is all human theory, that the heliosphere protects the Earth, etc. NASA is still saying that the Sun reverses magnetic fields every 11 years when their own probe Ulysses proved this theory wrong. The S Pole of Planet X is pointed toward the Sun, and is an intake, not blowing outward like the magnetic N Pole of a magnetic planet. THIS is the cause of the placid no-sunspot surface of the Sun, and it is harmless.

[Intervene]

Great stuff. Unfortunate that it has been the only mission towards the sun, but good to know some new useful information such as it not being shaped as a perfect sphere as I had thought.

Nice video.

[stevebd1]

I thought the same thing myself. It appears that the increase of interstellar dust at the poles of the Sun, outside the plane of the solar system, would have chipped away at the solar panels.

[alien8ted]

More recognition should be given to our brilliant space probes. I read about Giotto, the ESA probe that surveyed Halleys comet, it's amazing what technological ingenuity can achieve in spite of all the physical and financial constraints.