I stumbled across this interesting bit. Apparently Voyager 1, which was thought to have left the solar system, may be stuck in the suns 'tractor' beam. I've only read these two sites so I am not sure if that means it 'cannot' leave or not. First link is the story, the second goes more into what a flux transfer event is. https://medium.com/the-physics-arxiv-blog/voyager-1-may-be-caught-inside-an-interstellar-flux-transfer-event-6911d42443b http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2008/30oct_ftes/
Considering we need a certain ammount of acceleration to break earths gravity, it stands to reason its the same for the sun Perhaps voyager never obtained enough acceleration to escape the suns orbit Idk about this flux thing or how it would affect voyager tho -yuri
I havent seen any mention of a gravitational influence unless this is gravity itself or in part. It is described as an inward (toward the sun) flux of charged particles in the form of a plasma, and Voyager I is stuck in an inward stream, becoming apart of the flow. Its interesting tge sun ejects particles (solar stream) away from itself and has a flux of uncoming particles toward itself. There is also a swirling torus of plasma around rotation celestial bodies. I am not sure how to best visualize/understand all of this. It would seem Voyager should moving back toward the sun, but they didnt specify that part.
its not hard to visualize. Basically the sun has a magnetic field just like the earth. And tje particles follow the field. To me the flux thing makes sense, I just don't see how it would be able to drag voyager back in. From what I understood from the article, voyager would have to fly to a very specific point in space to form close to the flux to begin with. It seems unlikely, but if true, terrible. I don't think voyager would give us much more info tho anyway -yuri
NASA could be blamed a lil for calling them "portals", but FTEs are typically a one way street. Our magnetosphere protects us from solar winds, but it was always known that our magnetosphere and the sun's connects.. and when and where they do, solar winds come pouring in.. but there is no data saying that solar winds or plasma or particles travel out from Earth to the sun. A FTE between the sun's magnetosphere and the interstellar medium might act differently, but I doubt it. Not only that, a FTE at the edge of the solar system could be as wide as the sun, or Earth's orbit, or Jupiter's orbit, or even as wide as the solar system.. the ones in Earth's magnetosphere are about the size of Earth. To imagine a FTE, just imagine the magnetosphere of Earth getting pressed on by the sun's.. and every 8ish minutes a hole opens up in our sphere where the fields connect and solar winds come flowing in. Our atmosphere protects us from them, either absorbing or deflecting them.. if it were weaker like Mar's atmosphere, the solar winds from FREe would strip the atmosphere bit by bit. Pretty much all the inner planets go through notable FTEs, where solar winds 'break through' the magnetosphere.
Hmm i think you are equating solar wind with an FTE. Solar wind is streaming away from the sun in all directions, yet it has FTE's with the interstellar medium which draws an inward current against the solar wind. Also, i am not sure why you think solar wind would blow away our atmosphere if it was smaller, especially if you adhere to standard models for planetary formation. Whereby planets are formed my residual dust condensing (which would mean at one point they had no atmosphere as they were forming around the sun). So either their was no solar wind when the planets formed or solar wind wouldn't blow away an atmosphere. That is just my opinion based on what i've read, maybe you've read something that says otherwise.
Couldn't they use the suns gravity to escape it? Swing back towards the sun and launch away? I don't know too much about physics though.
We're gonna need to blow up the sun to free Voyager. One last mission, united as a species against one common enemy, the sun. Sent from my iPhone using Grasscity Forum
Again, there is no data that states that there is any actual flow back into the sun.. FTEs are a popular source for quantum woo and a lot of pseudoscience. I've even seen people say that the FTE is the consciousness connection between the sun and Earth and consciousness flows back and forth, when the entire time, there has never ever been any data the says there is an outward flow. That's not what a FTE is.. a FTE is simply when a hole of sorts opens up in the magnetosphere that allows solar winds, plasma, whatever else the sun throws at us that is deflected by the magnetosphere to enter. Here is another article that should help give you an idea of what FTEs actually are: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/messenger/multimedia/magnetic_tornadoes.html Like I said, NASA can receive some of the blame for calling them portals because it gives the impression that it's an actual portal.. and that's what the quantum woo people jumped on, the portal concept. Yet there never was any data or information that says anything flows from Earth to the sun. FTEs are simply breaks in the magnetosphere where everything that the magnetosphere protects us from can flow in. And I never said smaller, I said weaker. Mars' magnetosphere is extremely weak.. unlike how it was when Mars first formed. It's a dying planet and because of that, solar winds can easily strip its atmosphere bit by bit. Not the case so much for Earth because our fields are stronger.
Quantum woo? I didnt say a flow from earth to sun, i said from interstellar medium to sun and from sun to planets. I find it odd they suggest the sputtering caused by solar wind stripped mars atmosphere while it is continually preserving mercury's atmosphere. I cannot send this pdf but if you are curious about more in depth exploration of magnetic interactions search for 277-Ch21.pdf itll be the first link that comes up.
" "Mercury's atmosphere is so thin, it would have vanished long ago unless something was replenishing it," says Dr. James A. Slavin of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md., a co-investigator on NASA's MESSENGER mission to Mercury. That something could be the solar wind, a thin gas of electrically charged particles, called a plasma, which blows constantly from the surface of the sun. The solar wind moves quickly, usually around 250 to 370 miles per second (about 400 to 600 kilometers/second); fast enough to blast atoms off the surface of Mercury. Through a process called "sputtering," solar wind particles that crash into Mercury's surface transfer sufficient energy to launch some atoms into ballistic trajectories high above the surface and replenish Mercury's atmosphere, according to Slavin."
Well.. when you say that you think Voyager could be stuck in a FTE and that because of it, it could be moving back to the sun due to the flow.. its reasonable to think that you think FTEs flow to the sun.. lol, is it not? Notice the "could be"? Meaning they don't know if the solar winds are actually replenishing the atmosphere. There could be a whole other reason, but it is more than likely what is happening. Just because it happens for one planet doesn't mean it will for them all.. and chances are in the early solar system, Mars had a stronger magnetosphere preventing it.. but since Mars is on the verge of death, there isn't much magnetic strength holding its atmosphere down. Meaning solar winds will more likely strip the atmosphere than replenish it. Don't take my word for it, take NASA's word in that link I gave you.
Interesting. I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say being gravitationally locked has something to do with it -yuri
You said flowing from earth to the sun, which i never said. Again from interstellar medium to sun, from sun to earth. I didnt say i think its stuck, thats what they are saying, i just passed it along. And that quote was from your link.
I know the quote is from my link.. and it is talking about Mercury's atmosphere, which isn't Mars' atmosphere.. which is what we are talking about. Every atmosphere is different so you can't say that if something applies to one, it must apply to all.. seeing as the magnetosphere and atmosphere of both Mercury and Mars are vastly different. But you say you never said it was stuck.. but you literally said that it could be stuck in the sun's tractor beam, when the article never said that. It never said that it would cause Voyager to flow back to the sun, all it said was that the FTE would allow interstellar medium in, but that would only be for a moment even if it did allow interstellar medium in seeing as there are still solar winds pushing back out. Once the FTE ends, any medium that did make it into the hole would get pushed back out. So I have no idea where you got the idea that Voyager is stuck seeing as no article linked in this thread said anything of the sort. The fact that you think it could be possible the Voyager is stuck in an inward stream (post #3) tells me that you have the wrong impression on what FTEs actually are.
Also, the link that you took the quote on Mercury from also states that FTEs will have an opposite effect for Venus and Mars than it does for Mercury.. circling back to Mars' atmosphere getting stripped by solar winds that enter through FTEs.
" Schwadron and McComas have a fascinating suggestion. They say Voyager 1 may be caught in a kind of magnetic portal known as an interstellar flux transfer event."