The Voyager Encounters

(Printable Version)

Information:

• Planetarium Show
• Suitable for grades 7th - adult
• Maximum 107 participants per session
• Approximately 45 minutes long

Description:

Narrated by actor Patrick Stewart, The Voyager Encounters provides a factual, yet entertaining tour of the outer planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Pluto) and their moons and rings, courtesy of the highly successful Voyager 1 and 2 missions. This thorough documentary discusses the functions of Voyager's instrument packages, the highlights of each flyby, and compares and contrasts each of the planet's atmospheres and magnetic fields, as well as their moons and ring systems.

Concepts:

• Voyagers 1 and 2 have sent approximately 86,000 photos back to Earth
• 5 trillion bits of scientific data have been sent back from the Voyagers' enough to encode over 6000 complete sets of the Encyclopedia Britannica
• A digital watch operates at a power level 20 billion times greater than the strength of the signals that the Voyagers are sending back to Earth
• Each Voyager has over 65,000 individual parts which is the equivalent of 2000 color TV sets
• Voyager 2 used gravity-assisted swing-bys, or slingshots, of Jupiter, Saturn, and Uranus in order to reach Neptune 20 years sooner than the direct Earth-to-Neptune route would have taken

Sunshine State Standards Addressed:

• SC.E.1.3.1 The student understands the vast size of our Solar System and the relationship of the planets and their satellites.
• SC.E.1.3.2 The student knows that available data from various satellite probes show the similarities and differences among planets and their moons in the Solar System.
• SC.E.1.4.2 The student knows how the characteristics of other planets and satellites are similar to and different from those of Earth.
• SC.E.2.4.6 The student knows the various ways in which scientists collect and generate data about our universe (e.g., X-ray telescopes, computer simulations of gravitational systems, nuclear reactions, space probes, and supercollider simulations.)
• SC.H.1.3.1 The student knows that scientific knowledge is subject to modification as new information challenges prevailing theories and as new theory leads to looking at old observations in a new way.
• SC.H.3.3.6 The student knows that no matter who does science and mathematics or invents things, or when or where they do it, the knowledge and technology that result eventually become available to everyone.