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NASA has managed to regain communication with the Voyager 1 spacecraft after five months of troubleshooting a persisting issue. Voyager 1 was launched just 16 days before its counterpart, Voyager 2, in 1977, and is the only spacecraft to ever leave the heliosphere-- the Sun's magnetic field that is the official border between our solar system and interstellar space. In November, Voyager 1 suffered from an issue where it began to send jumbled data that was impossible to understand. After months of troubleshooting, NASA finally managed to find out that there was a corrupted chip aboard the vessel, possibly ruined by wear or hit by some kind of space particle, and it was messing up over 3% of Voyager 1's memory. The team on Earth then split the corrupted code up and sent it to different parts of the spacecraft, allowing it to send readable messages again. Both spacecrafts have had issues in the past, including a seven-month period where Voyager 2's antenna was facing in the wrong direction, but it is a new challenge every time. The NASA Voyager team expects to receive some new scientific data from Voyager 1 in the coming days, which will be exciting for them-- every update has the possibility for new discoveries as the spacecrafts cruise through interstellar space.
Fact of the Day (Reader's Digest): The processed meat company Spam actually gets its name by combining spice and ham.
Quote of the Day (Gracious Quotes): Ideas are easy. Implementation is hard. (Guy Kawasaki)
Word of the Day (Merriam-Webster): Exodus (noun)- An exodus is a situation in which many people leave a place at the same time—in other words a mass departure or emigration.
In a Sentence: The resort town eagerly anticipated the mass exodus from the cities to its beaches as summer approached.
That's great news! The Voyager spacecrafts are a feat of engineering, can't believe they are still humming along all these years later.