Goldstone Solar System Radar Goldstone Solar System Radar The Goldstone Solar System Radar, or GSSR, is a large radar system used for investigating objects in the Solar system. Located in the desert near Barstow, California, it comprises a 500-kW X-band (8500 MHz) transmitter and a low-noise receiver on the 70-m DSS 14 antenna at the Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex. It has been used to investigate Mercury, Venus, Mars, the asteroids, and moons of Jupiter and Saturn. The most comparable facility is the radar at Arecibo Observatory. GSSR can work in two different modes. In the monostatic radar mode, GSSR both transmits and receives.
Stability of the Solar System Stability of the Solar System The stability of the Solar System is a subject of much inquiry in astronomy. Though the planets have been stable when historically observed, and will be in the short term, their weak gravitational effects on one another can add up in unpredictable ways. For this reason (among others) the Solar System is chaotic, and even the most precise long-term models for the orbital motion of the Solar System are not valid over more than a few tens of millions of years. The Solar System is stable in human terms, and far beyond, given that it