NASA’s Advanced Composite Solar Sail System: Pioneering the Future of Space Travel

Sailing through space may sound like science fiction, but NASA is turning this concept into reality with its Advanced Composite Solar Sail System. Set to launch aboard Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket from Māhia, New Zealand, this groundbreaking technology promises to revolutionize space travel and enhance our understanding of the Sun and solar system.

Solar sails propel spacecraft using sunlight, eliminating the need for heavy propulsion systems and enabling longer, cost-effective missions. Traditional solar sails, however, have been limited by the materials and structure of their booms, analogous to a sailboat’s mast. NASA’s new system addresses these limitations with a novel approach.

A New Era of Solar Sailing

The Advanced Composite Solar Sail System features a twelve-unit (12U) CubeSat built by NanoAvionics, equipped with a new composite boom made from flexible polymer and carbon fiber materials. These booms are stiffer and lighter than previous designs. The mission aims to demonstrate the successful deployment of these booms and validate the sail’s performance. Once deployed, the solar sail will maneuver by angling its sail to adjust its orbit, similar to how a sailboat captures the wind.

“Booms have tended to be either heavy and metallic or made of lightweight composite with a bulky design – neither of which work well for today’s small spacecraft,” explained Keats Wilkie, principal investigator at NASA’s Langley Research Center. “This sail’s booms are tube-shaped and can be squashed flat and rolled like a tape measure into a small package while offering all the advantages of composite materials, like less bending and flexing during temperature changes.”

A Giant Leap for Space Exploration

Upon reaching its Sun-synchronous orbit, approximately 600 miles above Earth, the spacecraft will unroll its composite booms, deploying the solar sail to cover about 860 square feet. Spacecraft-mounted cameras will capture this pivotal moment, ensuring the sail’s shape and symmetry are optimal.

“Seven meters of the deployable booms can roll up into a shape that fits in your hand,” said Alan Rhodes, lead systems engineer at NASA’s Ames Research Center. “The hope is that the new technologies verified on this spacecraft will inspire others to use them in ways we haven’t even considered.”

The Promise of Solar Sails

NASA’s Small Spacecraft Technology program envisions these lightweight composite booms enabling larger scale missions to the Moon, Mars, and beyond. The design could support future solar sails as large as 5,400 square feet, with potential expansions up to 21,500 square feet.

“The Sun will continue burning for billions of years, so we have a limitless source of propulsion,” Rhodes stated. “Instead of launching massive fuel tanks for future missions, we can launch larger sails that use ‘fuel’ already available.”

Solar sails provide constant thrust, ideal for missions requiring unique vantage points to study the Sun and its impact on Earth. They could carry early warning systems for solar storms and coronal mass ejections, which can disrupt power grids, radio communications, and affect aircraft and spacecraft.

Beyond solar sailing, composite booms could construct habitats on the Moon and Mars, acting as framing structures for buildings or compact antenna poles for communications relays.

“This technology sparks the imagination, reimagining the whole idea of sailing and applying it to space travel,” said Rudy Aquilina, project manager at NASA Ames. “Demonstrating the abilities of solar sails and lightweight, composite booms is the next step in using this technology to inspire future missions.”

NASA Ames manages the Advanced Composite Solar Sail System project, designing and building the onboard camera diagnostic system. NASA Langley developed the deployable composite booms and solar sail system. NASA’s Small Spacecraft Technology program, part of the Space Technology Mission Directorate, funds and manages the mission. Rocket Lab USA, Inc. provides launch services, and NanoAvionics supplies the spacecraft bus.