Page 616 - Ultimate Visual Dictionary (DK)

THE MODERN WORLD
Probing the solar system

SPACE PROBES HAVE VISITED every planet
in the solar system. They take photographs
and gather data that cannot be collected
using Earth-based equipment. Some probes
fly past or orbit around planets or moons,
while others land. Two Voyager space
probes flew past the outer planets in the
1970s and 1980s. Two Viking spacecraft
landed on Mars in 1976. The Magellan
spacecraft orbited Venus from 1989 and A MAP OF JUPITER’S VAST MAGNETIC FIELD DIONE, ONE OF SATURN’S MOONS,
mapped its surface. The Pathfinder PRODUCED BY CASSINI’S INSTRUMENTS ORBITING ABOVE THE “A” RING
spacecraft landed on Mars in 1997 and
released a rover vehicle to explore High-gain
the surface. The Mars antenna
Exploration Rover (MER)
Sun sensor Visible and
Mission landed two rovers
infrared
in 2003. The Cassini space
Helium spectrometers
probe reached Saturn in tank
2004, and in 2005 its Remote sensing
pallet
mini-probe, Huygens,
landed on one of its Wide-angle
moons, Titan, and camera
became the first
Radio-isotope
probe to land thermoelectric
on a moon of generator
another planet.

Magnetometer

Fields and
particles
intruments
Attitude control
thruster
Huygens mini
probe Main
PANORAMIC VIEW OF TITAN engines
TAKEN AS HUYGENS DESCENDED

Propulsion
module

Heat shield Reaction wheel Lower
equipment
module
CASSINI SPACE PROBE
AND HUYGENS MINI-PROBE

THE ROCK-STREWN SURFACE OF TITAN,
PHOTOGRAPHED BY HUYGENS

614