Voyager 1: Scientists finally know reason behind glitchy sound coming from space

Scientists have finally found out what's happening to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)'s pioneering Voyager 1 spacecraft, and what's behind the gibberish sounds coming from it in November. NASA launched the space probe Voyager 1 in 1977 to study the outer Solar System, the interstellar space beyond the Sun's heliosphere.

Voyager 1, which is the most distant spacecraft to Earth, has been acting weird and talking gibberish on the interplanetary "radio". It has left the scientists perplexed.

NASA previously said that the engineers and other experts were working to resolve an issue with one of Voyager 1's three onboard computers, called the flight data system (FDS).

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The FDS collects data from the science instruments and works on compiling information into a data package when it works properly. It also tells about the health and status of the spacecraft.

The data is then transmitted back to Earth using the telecommunications unit (TMU) once compiled.

The spacecraft was apparently receiving and executing commands sent from Earth. However, the FDS is not communicating properly with one of the probes TMU.

Hence, data was reaching Earth.

NASA said that the data wasin the form of ones and zeros (or binary code). But scientists might finally make sense of the gibberish data.

This happened after a computer onboard the Voyager called the FDS after being asked about it in a coded message and sent in March in the form of a poke command. The spacecraft revealed the issue.

After analysing the data which was a software readout, scientists have found out that three per cent of its memory is corrupted.

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The report revealed scientists were unable to fix the issue as they were unaware, hence, turning the FDS on and off also didn't help last year in November.

"The team is analysing the readout. Using that information to devise a potential solution and attempt to put it into action will take time," NASA said in a statement.

(With inputs fromagencies)