"Desitin for Pioneer"

The Hamburg artist Petrus Wandrey instigated the launch of the digitalism movement in 1978 with the unveiling of his work of art "Science and Beyond". It raises the view of the computer age to the level of a creative principle.

Since then, Wandrey has used the screen pixel as a means of creating a constructive alliance between art and technology. The artist has the following to say about "Desitin for Pioneer" and the artistic goals achieved within it:

"The overall portrayal relates to the future and conveys the interest and enthusiasm for advanced technology. The concept of finding an internationally comprehensible form of communication with an abstract and pictorial system of symbols will also be an attractive proposition in the future, yet it will always fail to catch on because of the extensive vocabulary that people need to communicate with each other in daily life. This is a stepping stone and opportunity for information symbols, which, when combined with characters, are important for interpersonal contact between human beings. In contrast to the script that has evolved, products of civilisation are created as soon as they are needed.

Desitin Arzneimittel GmbH has proved this since its foundation.

The motifs are adaptations of the information disk on the NASA Pioneer 10 space probe (still in orbit on missions)."

The cosmic messages of greeting on the Jupiter probes Pioneer 10 and 11 launched in 1972 and on the two "Voyager" space crafts which have now been launched will definitely not be read in the next 44,000 years – this is how long it takes for the space robots to pass by the next fixed star.

The human couple was drawn by Linda Salzmann-Sagan, Carl Sagan's wife at the time. They are standing in front of the Pioneer 10 space craft in order to depict the size of the human body. On their left is the "pulsar card", which Frank Drake devised in order to identify the position of our solar system based on the distances to 14 different pulsars.

The proportional length of the respective lines stands for their distance from the central point, the sun. Along each line are the pulsar cycles in binary digits; the radiation of the hydrogen atom has been used as a universal unit for time and length. In order to show the message's recipients that the basic beam of the hydrogen line is also the universal time measurement device and ruler, a diagram of the hydrogen atom has been added via the pulsar card.

On the lower edge of the card Carl Sagan added the sun and the planets, whose diameter was stated in the multiple of hydrogen wavelengths. On the flight path, which starts from the third planet, there is a diagram of Pioneer 10. You can see how the space craft rises between the largest and the ringed planet.

The pioneer probe was launched on 2 March 1972 in order to explore the outer planets and then to leave the solar system with a message on board. It took over 300 pictures of Jupiter, which was 130,000 km away, when it flew past it in December 1973. Then the probe utilised Jupiter's enormous gravitational field to overcome the sun's force of attraction at a speed of 54,000 km/h.

The thirty-year-old probe supplied important scientific data which increased our knowledge of the edge of the solar system until the official end of its mission on 31 March 1997. Thus, it was used to explore the heliosphere, which was previously only thought to extend as far as the orbit of Jupiter. Thanks to the Pioneer probe, it is now known that the range of solar wind extends well past Pluto's orbit. Now the probe is only looked after by a team of volunteers.

After its glorious scientific career comes to an end the Pioneer probe will have wandered around in galactic orbit for millions if not billions of years. With a message from a species called man that will probably long since have perished it will roam through the infinity of space until it is captured by a star and becomes its companion or burns up in it. It is less likely that the probe will be discovered by an extraterrestrial civilisation. Nevertheless, it will prove the existence of an intelligent species that dared to venture into the interstellar realm in its unquenchable thirst for knowledge.

By galactic standards, the Pioneer probe is still on our doorstep – only 80 Å (= angstrom unit, astronomical unit, around 12,000,000,000 km) away from earth. To cover this distance in a car travelling at 100 km/h, it would take over 13,500 years!

Pioneer 10 is moving away from earth at a constant speed of 12.24 km per second or 2.58 Å per year. By the time the probe has reached a distance of 1.5 parsec (309,000 Å or 4.88 light years) in 126,000 years the gravitation of the sun will take effect on the probe. Then the Pioneer 10 probe will be under the influence of the stars it flies past.

Pioneer will pass by several stars on its probably never-ending journey. The probe will only "meet" its first star, Ross 248, a red dwarf star on the scale of 11 in the Taurus constellation, which will be 10.3 light years away. Pioneer is heading in the direction of Aldebaran or Alpha Tau, a red giant with a 36-fold solar diameter, which is approximately 68 light years away; it will reach this star in around 2 million years.

Have a good journey Pioneer!

"Pioneer 10 is not answering any more -
Space probe disappears into infinity

NASA has lost contact with Pioneer 10, one of its oldest and most successful space probes. The Internet service SPACE has now disclosed that data transmission was already broken off in August 2000. Hopes of regaining contact with the probe are apparently very small.

Pioneer 10 was launched on 2 March 1972 and has since distanced itself 11 billion kilometres from earth. Thus, it has penetrated deeper into space than any other artificial space craft. NASA engineers originally built the probe for a mission to Jupiter. After it successfully flew past the planet in December 1973 Pioneer proved that it still had a lot of life left in it. Up until its last contact it was still supplying scientific data from the edge of our solar system.

In July 2000 NASA tried to turn Pioneer 10 slightly in order to align its antennas more precisely in the direction of Earth. According to SPACE, this attempt failed. In August 2000 signals could still be intercepted from the probe, but data transmission was not possible.

The Pioneer mission was officially terminated in 1997. Since then, a team of volunteers has maintained contact with the probe.

Axel Tillemans

"Pioneer 10 is alive"

Last Saturday NASA managed to restore contact with its missing space probe Pioneer 10. As NASA reports, it was possible to make contact during a function test with a radio telescope positioned near Madrid.

Axel Tillemans

The information disk of Pioneer 10 caused quite a furore in puritanical, repressed American society, reaching strange proportions in some cases:

In newspapers readers' letters were published in which readers were worried about the reputation of human civilisation, as their ambassadors were going to be naked when making contact with extraterrestrials. The opinion of a reader published in the "Los Angeles Time" even went so far as to suggest that the sexual organs of the human couple should be completely destroyed and replaced by a stork with a baby. In order to demonstrate our progress to our galactic neighbours, we should send pictures of Santa Claus, Easter Bunnies and the good old fairy.

Women's organisations complained that the female person was lacking genitals compared to her male partner. Feminists also said she seemed too passive. One man voiced the suspicion that extraterrestrials could interpret the raised hand of the man as a Hitler salute. One Catholic institution pointed out that everything had been portrayed apart from God. The writer suggested that instead of people two hands should be shown folded in prayer. And, finally, someone suggested enclosing two genuine frozen corpses instead of the information disk with the people etched on it. NASA rejected this suggestion on the grounds that it would cause excess weight.

No less bizarre suggestions and comments are still doing the rounds today, 30 years later, in German-speaking forums. These range from comments ridiculing the sex-specific characteristics of the human couple on the disk and the anxiety that mankind has revealed its position to the extraterrestrial invaders to the wildest conspiracy theories.