Current:Home > ScamsVoyager 2 is the only craft to visit Uranus. Its findings may have misled us for 40 years. -EverVision Finance
Voyager 2 is the only craft to visit Uranus. Its findings may have misled us for 40 years.
View
Date:2025-04-12 10:44:03
- Much of our understanding of Uranus comes from Voyager 2's flyby, which to date remains the only time a spacecraft has visited the planet.
- Voyager 2's data on the magnetosphere surrounding Uranus has for decades left scientists perplexed.
- As a result, Uranus earned a decades-long reputation as an outlier in our solar system. But new research may be flipping that understanding on its head.
A lone spacecraft's visit to Uranus may have left us with the complete wrong impression of the ice giant for nearly 40 years.
The strange, sideways-rotating planet – the third largest in our solar system – has always been something of a mystery to astronomers. But when Voyager 2 got an up-close look at Uranus in 1986, scientists were able to glean some insights that, while confounding, at least shed some light on a crucial characteristic that seemed to set the planet apart from other giants like Jupiter.
Or so they thought.
A fresh look at the data collected during the Voyager 2 flyby revealed that the probe's visit to Uranus may have accidentally coincided with a rare interstellar event. The findings, published Monday in a study in the journal Nature Astronomy, suggest that our understanding of the planet's protective magnetic field, or magnetosphere, may be flawed.
“If Voyager 2 had arrived just a few days earlier, it would have observed a completely different magnetosphere at Uranus,” said lead study author Jamie Jasinski, a physicist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, in a statement. “The spacecraft saw Uranus in conditions that only occur about 4% of the time.”
Perseverance:NASA's rover captures stunning vista of Jezero Crater on Mars
Voyager 2 visited Uranus in 1986
Much of our understanding of Uranus comes from Voyager 2's flyby, which to date remains the only time a spacecraft has visited the planet.
The probe, along with its Voyager 1 twin, launched in 1977 from Cape Canaveral, Florida to explore the far reaches of our solar system. The probes, which continue to travel billions of miles away, have both reached interstellar space – Voyager 1 in 2012 and Voyager 2 in 2018, according to NASA.
But long before that, Voyager 2 stopped by Uranus, coming within 50,600 miles of Uranus's cloudtops. While encountering the planet on Jan. 24, 1986, the probe returned detailed photos and other data on the world, its moons, magnetic field and dark rings.
Why were scientists interested in Uranus' magnetosphere?
Voyager 2's data on the magnetosphere surrounding Uranus has, for decades, left scientists perplexed.
Magnetospheres provide a protective bubble around planets with magnetic cores and magnetic fields, shielding them from the sun's harmful flow of gas (or plasma) streaming out in solar winds. Scientists have long been interested in learning about the magnetospheres of other planets in hopes of better understanding Earth's own.
What made Uranus' magnetosphere so strange were its radiation belts with an unexpected intensity rivaling that of Jupiter's.
Just as mystifying was the absence of plasma. The energetic ionized particles are common to other planets’ magnetospheres, and scientists had theorized that the five major Uranian moons in the magnetic bubble should have produced them.
Instead, the Voyager 2 findings forced them to conclude that the moons must be inactive.
Solar wind may have skewed Voyager data: Study
As a result, Uranus earned a decades-long reputation as an outlier in our solar system.
Now, new research may be flipping that understanding on its head.
Though it was far from intentional, Voyager 2's flyby may have taken place at the same time that some unusual space weather was squashing the planet's magnetic field – skewing the probe's data. Solar winds pounding the magnetosphere would have temporarily driven plasma out of the system while also ratcheting up the power of the magnetosphere, according to the study.
So, instead of getting a full picture of Uranus, scientists back on Earth were presented with a misleading "snapshot in time," said Linda Spilker, project scientist for the twin Voyager probes at JPL, in a statement.
What that means is those five major moons of Uranus may be active after all.
“This new work explains some of the apparent contradictions, and it will change our view of Uranus once again," said Spilker, who served as one of the mission scientists for Voyager 2 during its visit.
Will NASA now revisit Uranus?
The study’s authors say their research highlights how little we know about Uranus and how critical future missions to the planet may be.
A 2022 report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine called on NASA to make another mission to Uranus a priority in the next decade – something the space agency appears to have in the works.
In plans highlighted in a 2023 report from Scientific American, NASA would launch a spacecraft by 2032 that would orbit the planet and send a probe into its atmosphere.
Eric Lagatta covers breaking and trending news for USA TODAY. Reach him at [email protected]
veryGood! (54822)
Related
- How to watch new prequel series 'Dexter: Original Sin': Premiere date, cast, streaming
- NFL power rankings Week 11: Steelers, Eagles enjoying stealthy rises
- Summer I Turned Pretty's Gavin Casalegno Marries Girlfriend Cheyanne Casalegno
- Minnesota man is free after 16 years in prison for murder that prosecutors say he didn’t commit
- Toyota to invest $922 million to build a new paint facility at its Kentucky complex
- Republican Vos reelected as Wisconsin Assembly speaker despite losing seats, fights with Trump
- 'Bizarre:' Naked man arrested after found in crawl space of California woman's home
- Kraft Heinz stops serving school-designed Lunchables because of low demand
- New Zealand official reverses visa refusal for US conservative influencer Candace Owens
- Denver district attorney is investigating the leak of voting passwords in Colorado
Ranking
- Could Bill Belichick, Robert Kraft reunite? Maybe in Pro Football Hall of Fame's 2026 class
- Skai Jackson announces pregnancy with first child: 'My heart is so full!'
- Deion Sanders doubles down on vow to 99-year-old Colorado superfan
- Kentucky officer reprimanded for firing non-lethal rounds in 2020 protests under investigation again
- The White House is cracking down on overdraft fees
- Kansas basketball vs Michigan State live score updates, highlights, how to watch Champions Classic
- NFL overreactions: New York Jets, Dallas Cowboys going nowhere after Week 10
- NFL power rankings Week 11: Steelers, Eagles enjoying stealthy rises
Recommendation
Google unveils a quantum chip. Could it help unlock the universe's deepest secrets?
The Daily Money: Mattel's 'Wicked' mistake
Full House Star Dave Coulier Shares Stage 3 Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma Diagnosis
NFL power rankings Week 11: Steelers, Eagles enjoying stealthy rises
Romantasy reigns on spicy BookTok: Recommendations from the internet’s favorite genre
GM recalling big pickups and SUVs because the rear wheels can lock up, increasing risk of a crash
Sister Wives’ Meri Brown Shares Hysterical Farmers Only Dating Profile Video After Kody Split
Hurricane-damaged Tropicana Field can be fixed for about $55M in time for 2026 season, per report