NASA’s Voyager 2 spacecraft has been traveling through interstellar space for years, powered by generators that lose a little electricity as their plutonium supply slowly decreases.
Engineers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory carried out a careful operation nicknamed the Big Bang. They switched off some powered devices and replaced them with lower-power alternatives while keeping the spacecraft warm enough to work.
The saved power should let Voyager 2 keep its three remaining science instruments operating for at least one extra year. Without the change, the team expected to turn off another instrument before the end of 2026.
The engineers plan to try a similar power-saving change on Voyager 1 in the coming months, helping both long-lived spacecraft continue sending back clues about the space between the stars.
