Space probes

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The two van Allen twin space probes, known originally as the Radiation Belt Storm Probes (RBSP), are about to complete their two-year primary mission, as they were launched on August 30, 2012. They’re still collecting data in the Van Allen radiation belts, two rings – one internal and one external – of electrically charged particles created by the Earth’s magnetic field around the equator. An article just published on line and then on paper in “Physical Review Letters” illustrates the mechanism of electron acceleration in the Van Allen belts.

Assemblage of pictures that show the binary nucleus of the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko taken by the Rosetta space probe (Image ESA / Rosetta / MPS for OSIRIS Team MPS / UPD / LAM / IAA / SSO / INTA / UPM / DASP / IDA)

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ESA’s Rosetta space probe awakened in January 2014 after a journey that lasted almost ten years. In recent weeks, it started sending pictures of its target, the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Yesterday, CNES, the French space agency, published a composition of photos taken on July 11 which show that the comet is composed of two nuclei that are attached, a fact that makes the Rosetta mission even more extraordinary.

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After nearly a month spent going in and out the upper layer of the atmosphere of Venus, at an altitude between 130 and 135 km (about 81 to 84 miles), in recent days the Venus Express spacecraft has started the series of maneuvers that will bring it up to around 460 km (about 286 miles) of altitude. It wasn’t certain that Venus Express could survive the harsh conditions that are found even at those altitudes but this success will allow the probe to make a few more detections before running out of fuel and finally falling to the planet.

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A kind of solar tsunami hit the Voyager 1 space probe in March this year, a wave of plasma emitted by the Sun that rings like a bell. An instrument of the probe allows to measure the frequency of the sounds produced by these waves, a truly unique music in the interstellar space reached by Voyager 1.