Solar sails have some major advantages over traditional propulsion methods—most notably, they don't use any propellant. But, ...

An experimental NASA solar sail can be seen in the night sky as it orbits the Earth. NASA's Advanced Composite Solar Sail System (ACS3) launched in April 2024 atop a Rocket Lab Electron rocket. The ...

Nasa has unfurled a solar sail in space for the first time, aiming to harness the propulsive power of sunlight for interstellar travel. The US space agency revealed that it had deployed the solar sail ...

After years and many setbacks the Planetary Society’s test spacecraft deployed its 344 square foot solar sail in space over the weekend. The society’s LightSail is a cubesat whose initial flight will ...

A solar sail is designed to capture the tiny amounts of radiation pressure exerted by sunlight to propel a spacecraft to incredible speeds. The advantages are numerous: by acting like a sailing ship ...

A variety of sailcraft missions are in the works. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works. Solar sailing can be a relatively slow-motion ...

For a number of years now NASA’s Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program has been the driving force behind some of space exploration’s craziest, most spectacular, and daring ideas born in the ...

A Discussion Meeting on “Solar Sail Mission Applications” will be held on the morning of FRIDAY 10th MAY 2002 in the Lecture Theatre of the Geological Society, Burlington House, Piccadilly, LONDON.

NASA is about to test its Advanced Composite Solar Sail System, which if is successful will unlock a new method of cheap space travel in the solar system and perhaps even beyond. On April 23 NASA ...

The craft's square-shaped, aluminized Mylar sail shines in the sunlight. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works. Tuesday (July 23), The ...

THE next generation of spacecraft propulsion systems could be dead in the water before they are even launched. A physicist is claiming that solar sailing- the idea of using sunlight to blow spacecraft ...

The Planetary Society’s experimental LightSail 2 spacecraft — designed to fly on light coming from the Sun — has lived up to its namesake. The nonprofit today announced that the satellite has ...