Voyager 2 Plasma Wave Electric Field Waveforms from Neptune Encounter

Electric field waveform samples from the Voyager 2 Plasma Wave Receiver during its Neptune encounter. The data consists of about 271 frames, each containing up to 800 lines of 4-bit samples collected at 28,800 samples per second. This dataset was produced by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and is described in publications from 1977 and 1989.

Use Cases

• Producing frequency-time spectrograms based on Fourier-transformed waveform lines.
• Studying transient events like dust impacts on spacecraft based on raw waveform plots.
• Cross-calibrating waveform spectra with spectrum analyzer data mentioned in the description.

Strengths

• Sampling rate of 28,800 samples per second provides high temporal resolution.
• Automatic Gain Control provides an overall dynamic range of about 100 db.
• Data structure is defined with frames and lines, analogous to image telemetry.

Limitations

• Absolute calibration is not directly available as the Automatic Gain Control setting was not returned.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Collection Method

Collected by the Voyager 2 Plasma Wave Spectrometer (PWS) instrument.

Time Range

Neptune Encounter period.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-04-10 04:36:24.608396; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Interplanetary space near Neptune.