COSMOS - My learnings

COSMOS - My learnings

I am watching Carl Sagan COSMOS and this post is in continuation my earlier mail. In this mail i tried to simplify mystery of Cosmos in my language.

1. The space scientists simplified distance measurements by assigning distance of earth to the sun as 1 A.U. Which is equivalent of 150 million Kms

2. Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars have clear surface while Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune have lots of materials floating.

3. Voyager 1 and 2 were sent to explore Mars, Jupiter and Saturn on 20 August 1977 with a 4 year mission. But it continues till date.

4. The NASA scientists have used alignment of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune which happens once in 175 years to launch Voyager.

5. Voyager speed is 3.5 AU per year means over 500 million Kms per year. Voyager 2 weighing 722 KG consumes only 400 watts for such a speed generated by nuclear source and usage of gravitational force (since it is so far from Sun, it can not use solar power).

6. Voyager 2 is still working after 37 years and sending signals to earth.

7. The current location of Voyager 2 is over 100 AU - 16 billion km and send pictures of interstellar space.

8. Voyager 1 is crossing the helio sheath from north and voyager 2 is moving towards south.

9. With proper conservation of energy, it's predicted that they can last upto 2025.

10. The initial budget of the project was 865 million dollars. NASA spends just 5 million dollars to sustain this initiative.