what is solar sail?

Answer 1

Solar sails (also called light sails, especially when they use light sources other than the Sun) are a proposed form of spacecraft propulsion using large membrane mirrors. Radiation pressure is small and decreases by the square of the distance from the sun, but unlike rockets, solar sails require no fuel. Although the thrust is small, it continues as long as the sun shines and the sail is deployed.

Solar collectors, temperature-control panels and sun shades are occasionally used as expedient solar sails, to help ordinary spacecraft and satellites make minor corrections to their attitude and orbit without using fuel. This conserves fuel that would otherwise be used for maneuvering and attitude control. A few have even had small purpose-built solar sails for this use. Some unmanned spacecraft (such as Pioneer 10) have substantially extended their service lives with this practice.

The science of solar sails is well-proven, but the technology to manage large solar sails is still undeveloped. Mission planners are not yet willing to risk multimillion dollar missions on unproven solar sail unfolding and steering mechanisms. This neglect has inspired some enthusiasts to attempt private development of the technology, such as the Cosmos 1.

The concept was first proposed by German astronomer Johannes Kepler in the seventeenth century.[1] It was again proposed by Friedrich Zander in the late 1920s and gradually refined over the decades

Solar sails of all varieties consist of a large, flimsy sail and some kind of payload that holds such things as antennas, computers, solar panels, guidance sensors, science instruments, cargo containers, or crew cabins. For most solar sails, what this boils down to is a small, heavy mass attached to the middle of a huge, lightweight sail.

Without any kind of support, when sunlight pushes on the sail, it will collapse and flow around the payload. Two ways people have come up with to stabilize the sail and prevent its are to support the sail in 3 dimensions with a structure or to spin the sail. Both methods work well to hold the sail out flat so it can catch as much sunlight as possible.



3 Axis Stabilized and Spin Stabilized

Answer 2

A solar sail is a large sheet of some thin mirror material that in theory could take advantage of the solar wind (streams of energetic particles shooting outward of the sun) to move a spacecraft in space.

No solar sails have been successfully deployed as primary propulsion systems, but research in the area is continuing. On August 9, 2004 Japanese ISAS successfully deployed two prototype solar sails from a sounding rocket. A clover type sail was deployed at 122 km altitude and a fan type sail was deployed at 169 km altitude. Both sails used 7.5 micrometer thick film.

A joint private project between Planetary Society, Cosmos Studios and Russian Academy of Science launched Cosmos 1 on June 21, 2005, from a submarine in the Barents Sea, but the Volna rocket failed, and the spacecraft failed to reach orbit. A solar sail would have been used to gradually raise the spacecraft to a higher earth orbit. The mission would have lasted for one month. A suborbital prototype test by the group failed in 2001 as well, also because of rocket failure.

A 15-meter-diameter solar sail (SSP, solar sail sub payload, soraseiru sabupeiro-do) was launched together with ASTRO-F on a M-V rocket at 21:28, February 21, 2006 UTC (06:28, February 22 JST) and made it to orbit. It deployed from the stage at 2146 UTC but opened incompletely

Answer 3

A solar sail, simply put, is a spacecraft propelled by sunlight. Whereas a conventional rocket is propelled by the thrust produced by its internal engine burn, a solar sail is pushed forward simply by light from the Sun. This is possible because light is made up of packets of energy known as “photons,” that act like atomic particles, but with more energy. When a beam of light is pointed at a bright mirror-like surface, its photons reflect right back, just like a ball bouncing off a wall. In the process the photons transmit their momentum to the surface twice – once by the initial impact, and again by reflecting back from it. Ever so slightly, propelled by a steady stream of reflecting photons, the bright surface is pushed forward.

Answer 4

A solar sail is a method which could be used for space travel. Basically it's a very large, thin sheet (probably Mylar), that will catch the photons of the sun. With a large enough sheet these photons will push a spacecraft along.

Answer 5

is it Solar Cell? If it is then Let me tell you.
It's a semiconductor(Silicon) with a bit of impurities mixed. When exposed to sun the silicon gives out charged electrons which moves from higher concentrated part to the lower one, just like water moves from high to Low. This movement of electron causes electricity in opposite direction ie low to high.


In sort these are batery kinda stuff which generates eletricity from solar energy and hence called the solar cell

Answer 6

I think it's a solar cell..it is a semiconductor device that converts photons from the sun (solar light) into electricity.

Answer 7

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Answer 8

Sail or cell.