As solar wind blows, our heliosphere balloons

What happens when the solar wind suddenly starts to blow significantly harder? According to two recent studies, the boundaries of our entire solar system balloon outward—and an analysis of particles rebounding off of its ...

The Voyagers in popular culture

Whether you're traveling across cities, continents or even oceans this holiday season, there is no long-haul flight quite like that of the Voyagers.

NASA's IBEX observations pin down interstellar magnetic field

Immediately after its 2008 launch, NASA's Interstellar Boundary Explorer, or IBEX, spotted a curiosity in a thin slice of space: More particles streamed in through a long, skinny swath in the sky than anywhere else. The origin ...

Study uncovers secrets of a clump-dissolving protein

Workhorse molecules called heat-shock proteins contribute to refolding proteins that were once misfolded and clumped, causing such disorders as Parkinson's disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, and Alzheimer's disease. ...

Voyager observes magnetic field fluctuations in heliosheath

As they near the outer reaches of the solar system, for the past several years the two Voyager spacecraft have been sending back observations that challenge scientists' views of the physics at the edge of the heliosphere, ...

No more solar wind for Voyager 1 spacecraft

(PhysOrg.com) -- The 33-year odyssey of NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft has reached a distant point at the edge of our solar system where there is no outward motion of solar wind.

The Stars My Destination

The Voyager spacecraft are now in the outermost layer of the heliosphere, traveling toward interstellar space - the first man-made spacecraft to travel such a vast distance from Earth.