Study of the Pioneer Anomaly: A Problem Set

Abstract

Analysis of the radio-metric tracking data from the Pioneer 10 and 11 spacecraft at distances between 20--70 astronomical units from the Sun has consistently indicated the presence of an anomalous, small, and constant Doppler frequency drift. The drift is a blue-shift, uniformly changing at the rate of (5.99 +/- 0.01) x 10^{-9} Hz/s. The signal also can be interpreted as a constant acceleration of each particular spacecraft of (8.74 +/- 1.33) x 10^{-8} cm/s^2 directed toward the Sun. This interpretation has become known as the Pioneer anomaly. We provide a problem set based on the detailed investigation of this anomaly, the nature of which remains unexplained.