Heliosphere Traveling Through Interstellar Space

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Caption:

This schematic shows our solar bubble moving through nearby interstellar space, or the space between stars. Interstellar space is shown in blue because it is filled with plasma, or ionized gas, that has a lower temperature than what is inside our solar bubble, also known as the heliosphere. Blue is about 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit (6,000 Kelvin). Red indicates hotter temperatures of about 2 million degrees Fahrenheit (1 million Kelvin). The black lines indicate the flow of the solar wind inside our solar bubble, and the flow of the interstellar wind in interstellar space.

Background Info:

The Voyager spacecraft were built and continue to be operated by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, in Pasadena, Calif. Caltech manages JPL for NASA. The Voyager missions are a part of NASA's Heliophysics System Observatory, sponsored by the Heliophysics Division of the Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington.

For more information about Voyager, visit http://www.nasa.gov/voyager and http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov .

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