Voyager 1 Still Producing

Voyager 1 is more than ten billion miles from the Sun after more than three decades in space, but it is still producing scientific data as it approaches the point where the Sun's influence is trumped by the environment of interstellar space.

Voyager is monitoring the solar wind as that wind begins what seems to be a complex interaction with what's called the interstellar wind. The probe, in fact, had to be re-oriented earlier this week to maintain contact with the solar wind-- a maneuver it hasn't been asked to perform since 1990-- and such rolls-and-holds will be necessary on a regular basis in the future.

One rough gauge of the challenge of interstellar flight is that after three decades Voyager is still in the Sun's neighborhood. It did take a roundabout route through the outer planets, but the simple fact is that the stars are still well beyond our reach.