Voyager 2’s Flyby Sheds Light on Uranus’s Magnetic Mystery

A latest evaluation of 38-year-old knowledge from NASA’s Voyager 2 spacecraft has offered contemporary insights into the distinctive magnetosphere of Uranus, based on a examine printed on November 11 in Nature Astronomy. Throughout Voyager 2’s 1986 flyby, Uranus’ magnetosphere was discovered to be unexpectedly distorted by a blast of photo voltaic wind. The findings recommend that the planet’s magnetic subject behaves in contrast to some other within the photo voltaic system.

Findings Spotlight Uncommon Magnetic Buildings

Jamie Jasinski, a planetary scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and California Institute of Expertise, and lead writer of the study, famous that Voyager 2’s timing occurred to coincide with an intense photo voltaic wind occasion, a uncommon prevalence close to Uranus. This compression of Uranus’s magnetosphere, seen solely round 4% of the time, is regarded as chargeable for the distinctive measurements Voyager captured. Had the spacecraft arrived even per week earlier, Jasinski noticed, these situations would doubtless have been completely different, presumably resulting in various conclusions about Uranus’s magnetic traits.

Not like Earth, Uranus reveals a posh “open-closed” magnetic course of, influenced by its excessive axial tilt. This tilt topics Uranus to extremely variable photo voltaic wind results, leading to a magnetosphere that opens and closes cyclically.

Implications for Future Uranus Exploration

The examine’s conclusions transcend Uranus itself, providing insights into the magnetic behaviours of its outermost moons, together with Titania and Oberon. These moons, it seems, lie inside Uranus’s magnetosphere fairly than exterior it, making them candidates for investigations into subsurface oceans by way of magnetic subject detection. As Jasinski highlighted, these situations would simplify detecting any magnetic signatures that recommend liquid beneath the moons’ icy surfaces.

Whereas Voyager 2 stays the one mission to go to Uranus, the examine’s findings underscore a rising curiosity in exploring the ice big in better element.