Scientists are hoping to explain what they call the Pioneer Anomaly by digitizing and analyzing the 10 gigs of data stored on magnetic tape drives. The MSNBC space article on the subject is very vague about what the Pioneer Anomaly actually is. Apparently something at the edge of our solar system is 'pushing back' the Pioneer 10 and 11 probes. The probes were launched in 1972 and 1973 respectively. Apparently the probes are closer to the sun than people involved in the project think the probes should be. About 240,000 miles closer to the sun. Both probes are currently traveling about 30,000 miles an hour as the head out of our solar system. This discrepancy could be due to how the probes distance has been calculated, or it could be due to heat from the probes adversely effecting their trajectories, or it could be due to dark matter and unexplained mysteries of gravity. The New Horizon's probe, which is expected to reach beyond Pluto by 2015 is expected to throw additional information into this mystery. Also, it is hoped that magnetic tapes with detailed data about the probes' travel will reveal more information once digitized and analyzed.

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