The concept of solar sails is not particularly new; just check out Planetary Society’s LightSail 2, the French startup Gama, or NASA’s Advanced Composite Solar Sail System. But a group of researchers is pushing technology to new heights.
The Diffractive Solar Sailing project received Phase III status in NASA’s Innovative Advanced Concepts Program (NIAC), which includes a $ 2 million budget to make the team’s concept a reality.
Solar sails are a means of propulsion of spacecraft that operate similarly to the sails of ships, but instead of being powered by wind, they operate with light. Diffractive solar sails, such as the one being developed through NIAC, are a more efficient evolution of traditional solar sails that could one day help space missions.
“Diffractive candles are based on the optical mechanism of diffraction, while the traditional solar candles we’ve seen are based on the law of reflection,” Amber Dubill of the Applied Physics Lab told TechCrunch of Johns Hopkins University.
As before, the photons touching the sail give their impetus to the spacecraft, but Dubill’s team is working on a new twist on this proven technology:
The advantage of using diffraction to do this instead of reflection is the ability to adjust the angle at which the incoming light is redirected so that the resulting force is more efficient for orbital maneuvers without having to attach a large fragile structure.
The Diffractive Solar Sailing project has already completed Phase I and Phase II of the NIAC program, which is NASA’s high-risk, high-reward incubator exploring the possibilities of an unusual technology in space. These first phases are dedicated to developing concepts and demonstrating their potential. Phase III, however, makes the transition from concepts to reality. (One aside, since the creation of NIAC in 2012, only five projects have received Phase III status, as most projects do not show enough potential in Phases I and II for NASA to continue later.)
Dubil and his team will use the $ 2 million in funding to design and manufacture sail materials, which they plan to test at various facilities across the country over the next two years.
“In parallel, we plan to evolve the vision of a polar solar orbiting sailboat mission by establishing optimal sailing trajectories and attitude control to achieve the solar observations of a payload suite dictated by our heliophysicists.” says Dubil. “Through the expansion of the design of diffractive sailing and the development of the general concept of sailing, the goal is to lay the groundwork for a future demonstration mission using diffractive light sailing technology.”
This solar polar orbit mission is of particular interest to NASA, as the poles of our star have not yet been explored. “Obtaining a complete picture of the corona and surface magnetic fields is critical to the forecasting and awareness of space-time, and a constellation of instrumented candles surrounding the sun will not only improve our understanding of our star more “But it will increase the warning time for solar power. Events that can damage satellites and terrestrial systems,” Mike LaPointe, NIAC’s chief executive officer, told TechCrunch.
LaPointe suggests that the same technology could be used in similar missions throughout the solar system. With this potential, it is not surprising that NASA has funded the Diffractive Solar Sailing project; now you just have to get out of the way.