# Presentation: 116042

## Interstellar Probe: Leaving the HeliosphereA Mission of Highlights

- Could be accomplished by nuclear propulsion or a conventional method with high C3.
- Collect in situ data during entire cruise
- Average data rate ~ 2 kbps
***Technology Development***
- High C3 launch capability
- Communication Architecture: Ka-band, capable ground-stations as phased array
- Next generation RTG
- Measurement technologies that work on nuclear platforms if needed.

***Interstellar Probe: Leaving the Heliosphere******A Mission of Highlights***

***Science Objectives***
*Explore****	***
- the nature of the interstellar medium and its implications for the origin and evolution of matter in our galaxy and the universe.
- the influence of the interstellar medium on the solar system, its dynamics, and its evolution.
- the impact of the solar system on the interstellar medium as an example of the interaction of a stellar system with its environment.
- the outer solar system in search of clues to its origin, and to the nature of other planetary systems.
*Determine the conditions on the pathway to the nearest neighboring star.*
***Measurement Strategy***
- Measure, in situ, the properties and composition of interstellar plasma and neutrals, low-energy cosmic rays and interstellar dust.
- Determine the structure and dynamics of the heliosphere with in situ measurements and global imaging.
- Map the infrared emission of the zodiacal dust cloud, measure in situ the distribution of interplanetary dust, and determine the radial distribution of Kuiper belt objects. ***	***

***Regions of Interest***
- >3 AU Beyond Zodical light
- >10 AU Kuiper Belt/Planetary Science
- >80 AU Termination Shock
- >120 AU Hydrogen Wall
- >150 AU Local Galactic Environment

## Interstellar Probe: Leaving the HeliosphereA Mission of Highlights

**Interstellar Probe, one of the great quests of space science—to penetrate into and explore the local interstellar medium, and its interactions with our solar system. **
**Why explore beyond the solar system?** Sending a spacecraft beyond the heliopause to begin the exploration of our local galactic neighborhood will be one of the grand scientific enterprises of the 21st century. Interstellar space is a largely unknown frontier that holds many of the keys to understanding our place in the
- galaxy. The rapidly expanding solar atmosphere—the solar wind—creates a bubble called the heliosphere that shields our solar system from the interstellar plasma and magnetic fields, and most of the cosmic rays and dust that comprise the local galactic neighborhood.
**Key Science Benefits? ****Interstellar Probe***** ***will discover unknown aspects of the outer solar system, explore the boundaries of the heliosphere to reveal how a star interacts with its environment, and directly sample the properties of the nearby interstellar medium. These studies will address key questions about the nature of the primordial solar nebula, the structure and dynamics of our heliosphere, the properties of organic material in the outer solar system, the nature of other stellar systems that may also harbor planets, the chemical evolution of our galaxy, and the origins of matter in the earliest days of the universe.

**Break through science**

**Continuous Science Benefits**
**Interstellar Probe **offers the ability to define the interactions between the solar system and its galactic neighborhood. Direct *in situ *observations of the interstellar medium will provide a unique opportunity to derive the physical properties of a sample of current interstellar matter free from the uncertainties that result from the exclusion of plasma, small dust particles, and low energy
- cosmic rays from the heliosphere, and free from the uncertainties that plague the interpretation of astronomical datasets. Interstellar Probe will measure the chemical and isotopic compositions of all three components of the ISM: neutral, plasma, and dust components.  Direct magnetic and electromagnetic field measurements will provide the first solid number for many of the regions of interest