Voyager Golden Record

We sent a gift to space.

It is a gold disk. Two of these disks fly on two spacecraft. They carry sounds and pictures from Earth.

The disks show many things. They show plants and animals. They show people and how they live. They even show the sun and planets.

The disks have many sounds. You can hear wind and thunder. You can hear birds and whales. There is also music from many lands.

We sent greetings in many ways to talk.

The disks help tell our story. They are like a time capsule for the stars.

One disk is on the farthest human object. It travels through the dark space between stars. It is a hopeful gift for the universe.

In 1977, NASA sent two spacecraft into space.

Each craft carries a special gift. These are the Voyager Golden Records. They are two identical gold disks. They act like a time capsule for the stars. They carry a story of life on Earth.

The records hold many sounds and images. The team chose 116 images. These show our planets and even DNA. They also show people, plants, and animals.

You can hear many sounds on the disks. There is wind, thunder, and birds. You can even hear whales. There are songs from many different cultures. The records also have greetings in 55 languages. One greeting is from the son of Carl Sagan.

The disks are made of copper. They are covered in nickel and gold. The cover is made of aluminum. It has a special part made of uranium-238. This element helps show how old the record is.

Voyager 1 is now the farthest human object from Earth. It travels through the space between stars. It may pass near a star in 40,000 years.

The Voyager Golden Records are two identical gifts sent into deep space. They are copper disks covered in nickel and gold. Each record travels aboard one of two Voyager spacecraft. These crafts were launched by NASA in 1977. The records act like a time capsule for the universe. They are meant for any intelligent life that might find them.

One craft, Voyager 1, is the farthest human-made object from Earth. It has already reached interstellar space, which is the region between stars. The records carry a story of our world and its people.

Making the records involved many careful steps. A team led by Carl Sagan chose the contents. They picked 116 images to show life on Earth. These pictures show things like DNA, planets, and human anatomy. They also show animals, plants, and many different cultures.

The sounds were chosen to represent our world too. There are natural sounds like wind, thunder, and whales. There are also greetings in 55 different languages. Even the brainwaves of Ann Druyan were recorded for one minute. The images are encoded as signals that can be turned into pictures.

Many scientists and artists helped build this project. John R. Casani was the project manager. He gave Carl Sagan a budget of $1,500 for six weeks of work. Sagan and his team actually spent more of their own money. A company in Boulder, Colorado, helped encode the images into grooves. The music was chosen by a large team of experts. They included people like Linda Salzman and Frank Drake. Even a young sound engineer named Jimmy Iovine helped out. They even included music by famous composers like Bach and Mozart.

There are many interesting facts about these disks. The records are made of copper plated with gold. The aluminum cover has a sample of uranium-238 on it. This element can help aliens tell how old the record is. The team also etched a message on the disk. It says, "To the makers of music – all worlds, all times." This was added to the run-out groove. Voyager 1 will pass near the star Gliese 445 in about 40,000 years. This star is in the constellation Camelopardalis.

You can think of the records like a message in a bottle. Carl Sagan called the launch a "bottle" tossed into a cosmic "ocean." Just as a bottle might float to a far shore, these records float through space. They carry our music, our sounds, and our faces to the stars. They represent a very hopeful idea about life on our planet. Even if no one finds them, they still travel through the dark. They are a permanent part of our history moving through the stars.

The Voyager Golden Records are two identical phonograph records sent into deep space. One copy travels aboard each of the two Voyager spacecraft launched by NASA in 1977. These records function as a cosmic time capsule. They contain sounds and data meant to portray the diversity of life and culture on Earth. The goal is to provide a message for any intelligent extraterrestrial life form that might find them.

While the spacecraft are not heading toward a specific star, Voyager 1 will pass within 1.6 light-years of the star Gliese 445 in about 40,000 years. This star is located in the constellation Camelopardalis.

Creating the records required a careful process of encoding information into physical grooves. The images are encoded in analogue form using 512 vertical lines. This method allows the signals to be reconstructed into raster scan images. The instructions for playing the record are printed on its aluminum cover. A drawing shows that the record should be played from the outside in using a stylus. The cover also explains how to turn signals into pictures, much like analog television.

To ensure accuracy, the first few images define all measurements using physical constants. These constants remain the same throughout the entire universe.

The contents of the records were selected by a committee chaired by Carl Sagan of Cornell University. The selection process lasted almost a year. The team assembled 116 images to represent our world. These include scientific diagrams of DNA, human anatomy, and the Solar System. They also include photographs of animals, plants, and various human cultures. Many images show people eating, building architecture, or going about daily life. Some images even include indications of chemical composition or scales of mass.

Audio content provides a different way to understand Earth. The records feature natural sounds like wind, thunder, surf, and the songs of whales. Human voices are included through greetings in 55 ancient and modern languages. This includes a greeting from U.N. Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim and a greeting from Sagan's son, Nick. The collection also features a wide variety of musical selections. These range from classical composers like Bach and Mozart to rock music like Chuck Berry's "Johnny B. Goode." Even the brainwaves of Ann Druyan were recorded and compressed into one minute of audio.

The development of the project involved many key figures and specific constraints. Project manager John R. Casani gave Sagan a budget of $1,500 for six weeks of work. He also required the record to be as light as the earlier Pioneer plaques. Sagan, Linda Salzman, and Frank Drake realized that metal phonograph records would last longer than magnetic tapes. The records themselves are copper disks plated with nickel and then gold. The manufacturing involved the JVC Cutting Center in Colorado and the James G. Lee record-processing center in California.

There are several remarkable details regarding the physical construction of the records. The aluminum cover is electroplated with an ultra-pure sample of the isotope uranium-238. Because uranium-238 has a half-life of 4.468 billion years, it can act as a clock. An advanced civilization could use the ratio of remaining uranium to determine the record's age. Additionally, an inscription was hand-etched into the run-out groove. It reads, "To the makers of music – all worlds, all times." This was an unplanned addition that Sagan fought to keep on the final version.

The Voyager mission connects human history to the vastness of interstellar space. Both Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 have already reached interstellar space, the region between stars containing galactic plasma. Voyager 1 is currently the farthest human-made object from Earth. Carl Sagan viewed the launch as a hopeful gesture. He compared the spacecraft to a "bottle" being tossed into a cosmic "ocean." Even if no one ever plays the records, they remain a permanent record of our existence moving through the stars.