Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
Mission: investigating Jupiter and Saturn, and the moons of these planets. Its continuing data feed offered the first direct measurements of the heliosheath and the heliopause. It is currently the furthest man-made object from Earth, as well as the first object to leave the heliosphere and cross into interstellar space.
First solar-powered Jupiter orbiter, first mission to achieve a polar orbit of Jupiter. 2011-040A: JUICE: ESA: 14 April 2023 (launch) orbiter en route mission to study Jupiter's three icy moons Callisto, Europa and Ganymede, eventually orbiting Ganymede as the first spacecraft to orbit a satellite of another planet. [60] Europa Clipper: NASA
Searches for more satellites have been unsuccessful, putting the maximum radius of any other satellites at 90 m (100 yd). [4] Jupiter has 95 moons with known orbits; 72 of them have received permanent designations, and 57 have been named. Its eight regular moons are grouped into the planet-sized Galilean moons and the far smaller Amalthea group ...
Artificial satellites and space probes in the 1970s Year Origin Name Target Status Description 1970 Japan: Ohsumi: Earth: Success: First Japanese satellite. Japan became the fourth nation after the USSR, USA and France to successfully put an artificial satellite into orbit on its own. West Germany: DIAL Earth Success Second German satellite.
Repeat orbit: An orbit where the ground track of the satellite repeats after a period of time. Gangale orbit: a solar orbit near Mars whose period is one Martian year, but whose eccentricity and inclination both differ from that of Mars such that a relay satellite in a Gangale orbit is visible from Earth even during solar conjunction. [28]
The Galilean moons are named after Galileo Galilei, who observed them in either December 1609 or January 1610, and recognized them as satellites of Jupiter in March 1610; [2] they remained the only known moons of Jupiter until the discovery of the fifth largest moon of Jupiter Amalthea in 1892. [3]
Most of the larger moons orbit their planets in prograde direction, matching the direction of planetary rotation; Neptune's moon Triton is the largest to orbit in the opposite, retrograde manner. [50] Most larger objects rotate around their own axes in the prograde direction relative to their orbit, though the rotation of Venus is retrograde. [51]
Mission name Launch date Description Ref(s) Sputnik 1: 4 October 1957 First Earth orbiter [1] [2] Sputnik 2: 3 November 1957 Earth orbiter, first animal in orbit, a dog named Laika [2] [3] [4] Explorer 1: 1 February 1958 Earth orbiter; discovered Van Allen radiation belts [5] Vanguard 1: 17 March 1958 Earth orbiter; oldest spacecraft still in ...