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Support for the Thermal Origin of the Pioneer Anomaly

Slava G. Turyshev, Viktor T. Toth, Gary Kinsella, Siu-Chun Lee, Shing M. Lok, and Jordan Ellis
Phys. Rev. Lett. 108, 241101 – Published 12 June 2012

Abstract

We investigate the possibility that the anomalous acceleration of the Pioneer 10 and 11 spacecraft is due to the recoil force associated with an anisotropic emission of thermal radiation off the vehicles. To this end, relying on the project and spacecraft design documentation, we constructed a comprehensive finite-element thermal model of the two spacecraft. Then, we numerically solve thermal conduction and radiation equations using the actual flight telemetry as boundary conditions. We use the results of this model to evaluate the effect of the thermal recoil force on the Pioneer 10 spacecraft at various heliocentric distances. We found that the magnitude, temporal behavior, and direction of the resulting thermal acceleration are all similar to the properties of the observed anomaly. As a novel element of our investigation, we develop a parametrized model for the thermal recoil force and estimate the coefficients of this model independently from navigational Doppler data. We find no statistically significant difference between the two estimates and conclude that, once the thermal recoil force is properly accounted for, no anomalous acceleration remains.

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  • Received 6 March 2012

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.108.241101

© 2012 American Physical Society

Authors & Affiliations

Slava G. Turyshev1, Viktor T. Toth2, Gary Kinsella1, Siu-Chun Lee3, Shing M. Lok3, and Jordan Ellis1

  • 1Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, 4800 Oak Grove Drive, Pasadena, California 91109-0899, USA
  • 2Ottawa, Ontario K1N 9H5, Canada
  • 3Applied Sciences Laboratory, 13111 Brooks Drive, Suite A, Baldwin Park, California 91706-7902, USA

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Issue

Vol. 108, Iss. 24 — 15 June 2012

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