Solar Sail Propulsion for Interplanetary Cubesats

NASA is developing two small satellite missions as part of the Advanced Exploration Systems (AES) Program, both of which will use a solar sail to enable their scientific objectives. Solar sails use sunlight to propel vehicles through space by reflecting solar photons from a large, mirrorlike sail made of a lightweight, highly reflective material. This continuous photon pressure provides propellantless thrust, allowing for very high (Delta)V maneuvers on longduration, deep space exploration. Since reflected light produces thrust, solar sails require no onboard propellant. Solar sail technology is rapidly maturing for space propulsion applications within NASA and around the world.