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(IOWA CITY, Iowa) A pair of Voyager spacecraft are still making discoveries 40 years after they launched. New research reports the first detection of bursts of cosmic ray electrons emanating from eruptions on the sun.
A team of physicists at the University of Iowa found that busts of cosmic ray electrons are being accelerated by the sun in shock waves. The detection occurred as the Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 spacecraft continue their journey outward through interstellar space.
“We’re really discovering that what we thought would be this quiet, pristine interstellar medium is actually disturbed considerably,” said Don Gurnett, a University of Iowa professor emeritus of physics and astronomy leading the research, per The Atlantic.
The discovery could help physicists better understand the underpinning shock waves and cosmic radiation that come from flare stars and exploding stars. The physics of such phenomena will become important to consider when sending astronauts on extended excursions, during which they would be exposed to higher concentrations of cosmic rays than those found on Earth.
The findings are published in the Astronomical Journal in a paper titled "A Foreshock Model for Interstellar Shocks of Solar Origin: Voyager 1 and 2 Observations."
The Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 spacecraft were launched in 1977 on a mission to explore the outer planets and reach the heliopause, the boundary between the hot solar plasma and the relatively cool interstellar plasma. NASA funded the research.