What would you say if I told you that the solar system is different from the space outside? Likely you'd look at me with a blank stare and say something along the lines of "and I care why?" Don't. It gets annoying. But seriously, the space outside of the solar system is different from the space inside, according to NASA's IBEX spacecraft. IBEX orbits Earth while scanning the skys for neutral atoms that can slip through the magnetic defences of the Heliosphere, the protective barrier formed by the sun's magnetosphere which protects the solar system from harmful outside radiaton.
What's so specifically different about the galaxy outside? The oxygen to neon ratio. Outside the solar system, there are approximately 74 oxygen atoms for every 20 neon atoms. Inside the solar system, there are approximately 111 oxygen atoms for every 20 neon atoms; a significant difference.
“There are at least two possibilities," says David McComas the principal investigator for IBEX at the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas. "Either the solar system evolved in a separate, more oxygen-rich part of the galaxy than where we currently reside or a great deal of critical, life-giving oxygen lies trapped in interstellar dust grains or ices, unable to move freely throughout space—and thus undetectable by IBEX."
While IBEX samples alien atoms from Earth orbit, NASA’s Voyager spacecraft have been traveling to the edge of the heliosphere for nearly 40 years—and they could soon find themselves on the outside looking in. Researchers expect Voyager 1 to exit the solar system within the next few years. The new data from IBEX suggest the Voyagers are heading for a new frontier, indeed.
For more information, check out the NASA article: http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2012/10feb_alienmatter/
