space probes
Unmanned celestial explorers
Space probes are unmanned spacecraft sent to explore celestial bodies or regions of space.
Unlike satellites, which orbit Earth, probes travel outward—to planets, moons, asteroids, or beyond the solar system.
Some fly by their targets, others orbit them, and some land: The Voyager probes have left the solar system.
Data from space probes has transformed our understanding of the cosmos.
- flybyClose pass without landing
- slingshot maneuverSpacecraft acceleration via planetary gravity
- orbiterBody circling another
- CassiniSaturn mission namesake
- landerSpacecraft for surface arrival
phone home · Juno · New Horizons · outer planets · Galileo · orbital mechanics · Huygens · satellites · interplanetary travel · Voyager · golden record · exploration · pale blue dot · heliosphere · solar wind · cosmic ray · planetary science · propulsion systems
- cosmosuniverse, galaxies, galaxy, stars, star
- aerospaceairplane, helicopter, rocket, rockets, astronauts
- NASAApollo, Artemis, astronauts, Cape Canaveral, Hubble
- space explorationrockets, Saturn V, satellites, mission, Falcon Heavy
- space scienceastronomy class, planetary science, cosmology, planets, stars
- spacecraftstarships, Voyager 1, rocket ships, Voyager 2, starship
space probeshuman spaceflight
Launching people into orbit
Space Shuttle · Apollo missions · Soyuz · Skylab · space stations
space probesradio telescopes
Instruments detecting celestial emissions
space probesgeological surveys
Scientific land structure analysis
space, probe, spaceship, spaces, spacecraft, probing, Hubble Space Telescope, probed, probes