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What it is : One of the final photographs ofNeptunetaken byNASA ’s Voyager 2 probe
Where it is:2.8 billion miles ( 4.5 billion kilometers ) fromthe sun
A false color photograph of Neptune was made from Voyager 2 images taken through three filters.
When it was taken : Aug. 25 , 1989
When it was shared : Aug. 19 , 2024
Why it ’s so special : Only one spacecraft has ever visited the eighth and most distant satellite from the sun .
On Aug. 25 , 1989 , NASA’sVoyager 2spacecraft took the first - ever snug - up images of Neptune . This one — among the last full - disk photos taken before the probe ended its " Grand Tour " of the planet — became one of the most iconic . It give away Neptune as a deep azure blue , which colored the world ’s perception of the planet for decades . ( That is , until a young treatment of Voyager 2 ’s image earlier this yearrevealed Neptune ’s genuine colorto be a much lighter gloomy green . )
Voyager 2 ’s original image were taken in false color using filter — a stock technique used by planetary astronomers . In this guinea pig , drear and green filters were used alongside one that passes light source at a wavelength absorbed by methane gas . According toscientists , H and He dominate Neptune ’s atmosphere , but methane gives it its puritanic appearance by absorb red light . The filter make methane look dark low in this image , but they also reveal a semitransparent daze layer across the major planet . The hopeful - red edge around Neptune is because of the haze scattering sunshine at higher altitudes , above most of the methane .
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Voyager 2 took this blastoff almost precisely 12 years after it launch on a Titan - Centaur rocket from Cape Canaveral , Florida . Having visitedJupiterin 1979 , Saturn in 1981 and Uranus in 1985 , Voyager ’s closest approach to Neptune come on Aug. 25 , 1989 . During the flyby , Voyager also inspect two of Neptune ’s moons , Triton and Nereid , and discovered six new moons andfour rings .
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Because Neptune is about 30 time farther from the sun than Earth is , it gets only a faction of a per centum of Earth ’s sunlight , think of Voyager 2 had to take long - exposure images . So engineers dismiss the fast - moving spacecraft ’s thruster to have it rotate so the camera could stay focused .
Voyager 2 ’s picture from Neptune were its last , sent back as radio signal with 13 - watt transmitters — about enough force to lam a refrigerator Inner Light bulb , accord toNASA — and took four 60 minutes to travel across thesolar systemto NASA ’s Deep Space connection of radio antennae across the world .
Neptune was Voyager 2 ’s last stop before it travel to the solar system ’s boundary . The investigation entered interstellar distance on Nov. 5 , 2018 . Voyager 2 remain NASA ’s longest - running missionary work , even afterencountering some communication problemslast summertime .
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