An artists rendering of a solar sail is shown in this undated publicity image from The Planetary Society released to Reuters. Backers of a failed mission to launch the world's first solar-sail spacecraft unveiled plans on Monday to try again five years later with a smaller, swifter satellite to test the limits of sunlight propulsion. (Handout/REUTERS) From Christian Science Monitor:
The US-based Planetary Society this week announced its second attempt to launch a small spacecraft with sails propelled by sunlight.
Its designers call it LightSail-1. And if it works as advertised, the solar sail project would represent a baby step toward humanity’s first starship.
This week, the California-based Planetary Society announced a new project to launch a small spacecraft propelled by a solar sail. In principle, the idea is simple: Use the sail to intercept sunlight, which presses on the sail much like wind on canvas. (The same pressure keeps the sun from collapsing under its own gravity.)
Read more ....
No comments:
Post a Comment