The Interstellar Probe — Exploring Space Between the Stars
The Interstellar probe will go further than any spacecraft before it — much further. Much, much further. And it could happen soon.
The edge of our solar system is home to just a handful of robotic explorers. Pioneer 10 and 11 were launched in the early 1970s, and the two Voyager craft followed in 1977. Now, New Horizons, the first spacecraft to visit the dwarf planet Pluto, is quickly headed outward into the void between the stars.
At these distances, it is convenient to measure distances in terms of astronomical units (AUs) the mean distance between the Earth and Sun. Neptune, the most distant planet, orbits roughly 30 AUs from the Sun, while the dwarf planet Pluto is found 40 AUs from the center of our solar system.
Join us on Astronomy News with The Cosmic Companion on May 25, when we talk with Dr. Elena Provornikova from the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab (APL), heliophysics lead for the Interstellar Probe.
Astronomers tend to define the edge of the Solar System as the distance at which streams of material from the Sun, called the solar wind, gives way to the medium of interstellar space. This heliosphere is found at a distance of 120 AUs from our stellar parent.
