For more on the Voyager project, see NASA's Voyager mission page.

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"This is very exciting: Voyager is beginning to explore the final frontier of our Solar System, " said Edward Stone, a Voyager project scientist based at California Institute of Technology.

BBC: NEWS | Science/Nature | Voyager 'at edge of Solar System'

The Voyager project scientist at Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Ed Stone, said he wanted to see a reorientation of the magnetic fields around the probe before declaring it to be in interstellar space.

BBC: Voyager Solar System 'exit' debated

Ed Massey, project manager for the Voyager mission, points out that no matter how clever and autonomous a probe is, it can only get itself out of situations it has been programmed to cope with.

ECONOMIST: The long arm of the celestial repairman

Nasa funded the study but said any assessment that Voyager might be in interstellar space did not reflect the view of everyone working on the project, and Prof Weber acknowledges there is an ongoing debate about the probe's status.

BBC: Voyager Solar System 'exit' debated

In March 1972, a plaque he designed with legendary astronomer Carl Sagan was blasted into space on board the Pioneer 10 spacecraft. ( Click here to see the Pioneer Plaque.) A few years later, Drake and Sagan would team up again on a much more ambitious project, attaching a gold-plated record full of music and photos onto the two Voyager probes.

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