Science Fiction
Dictionary
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
 |
NanoSail-D Solar Wind-Rider
Edward Montgomery's team and a team from Ames Research Center hope to deploy a solar sail called NanoSail-D this summer.
(NanoSail-D deployment video)
A SpaceX Falcon 1 rocket will carry it into space from Omelek Island in the Pacific Ocean between July 29th to August 6th.
"NanoSail-D will be the first fully deployed solar sail in space, and the first spacecraft to use solar pressure as a primary means of attitude control or orbital maneuvering," says Montgomery, who is NanoSail-D's payload manager."We are always on the lookout for opportunities. Ames owns a slot on the Falcon 1 launch and asked us if we wanted to go along. We said, 'Yes!' We'll use the Poly Picosatellite Orbital Deployer, or P-POD, developed by the University of California Polytechnic Institute to deploy our sail."
Science fiction fans have been looking forward to this for generations. As Arthur C. Clarke's wrote in his 1964 short story Sunjammer.
"Hold your hands out to the sun. What do you feel? Heat, of course. But there's pressure as well – though you've never noticed it, because it's so tiny. Over the area of your hands, it only comes to about a millionth of an ounce. But out in space, even a pressure as small as that can be important – for it's acting all the time, hour after hour, day after day. Unlike rocket fuel, it's free and unlimited. If we want to, we can use it; we can build sails to catch the radiation blowing from the sun."
It seems incredible, but the basic idea that light pressure would provide a mechanical means of propulsion may be found in Jules Verne's 1867 novel From the Earth to the Moon:
"...there will some day appear velocities far greater than these, of which light or electricity will probably be the mechanical agent..."
(Read more)
This is particularly noteworthy since the existence of light pressure was not even proven in theory until 1873 (by James Clerk Maxwell).
The Russian theoretician Konstantin Tsiolkovsky worked on the idea of solar sailing in the 1920's, but the first work to spark the interest of scientists and sf writers came in 1951, with the publication of "Clipper Ships of Space." This Astounding Science Fiction article was not a story, but an exposition of the principles of solar sails.
Cordwainer Smith wrote what was probably the first actual story about solar sails in 1960. "The Lady Who Sailed The Soul" took place in the far future, when people ventured on decades-long voyages in ships equipped with solar sails "tissue-metal wings with which the bodies of people finally fluttered out among the stars."
Soon thereafter, a 1962 short story by Jack Vance appeared - a classic named "Sail 25." This is the story of a "sink-or-swim" training cruise in which six space cadets find themselves under the unforgiving tutelage of Henry Belt, who stated that it was his fate to one day die in space:
The ship, great sail spread to the fading sunlight, fled like a ghost - out, always out. Each of the cadets had quietly performed the same calculations, and arrived at the same result. If the swing around Jupiter were not performed with exactitude, if the ship werre not slung back like a stone on a string, there was nothing beyond..."
(Read more from Sail 25).
Cordwainer Smith wrote another story in 1963 with more descriptions of this technology: "immense sails - huge films assorted in space on long, rigid, coldproof rigging."
Via NASA; thanks to Adi for writing in with the story tip.
Scroll down for more stories in the same category. (Story submitted 6/27/2008)
Follow this kind of news @Technovelgy.| Email | RSS | Blog It | Stumble | del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit |
Would
you like to contribute a story tip?
It's easy:
Get the URL of the story, and the related sf author, and add
it here.
Comment/Join discussion ( 1 )
Related News Stories - (" Space Tech ")
Beautiful Visualization of Dawn Spacecraft
'Then he became aware of a gentle pressure pushing him away from the ship.' - Isaac Asimov, 1939.
Tumblin' Tumbleweed Rovers To Eplore Mars
'His sensors out and working, and the whirring of the tape that sucked up sight and sound and shape and smell and form...' - Clifford Simak,
Tentacled Robot Captures Space Debris
Preventing annoying space debris build-up.
Reflect Orbital Sunlight On Demand
'I don't have to tell you about the seven two-mile-diameter orbital mirrors that circulate around the satellite, making it habitable.'
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
Science Fiction
Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's 1950's
1960's 1970's
1980's 1990's
2000's 2010's
Current News
You Will Eat The Cookies Made From Plastic...
'Our planes are going to start bringing in bales of discarded plastics...'
It's A Giant Robot! You Reporters Have Been Warned!
'... completely forgetting the ship at sight of the awesome figure and great head of the giant Gaut...'
Birds Learn To Sing Pictures ala Frank Herbert's Distrans
'We will fight in the time of fighting.'
ElectionSim: China's 'Ender's Game' Battle Sim, Or Lem's 'Kingdom In A Box'?
'So, Ender, we will now begin your education.'
Tactile Skin Supplier Map
'What strange sensitivity! What an amazing development of science was manifested in every move and act and word of this Robot!'
Flock Stymied By 'Adversarial Fashion'
'Forget the head atop it, the legs below, feet, arms, hands. It compels erasure.'
Orb Nomad Zero-Emission Electric Aircraft
'That explains how it was so easy for me to remain motionless in midair or to perch on a flagpole in imitation of a giant bird, even in the windy city of Chicago.'
ICE Buys Shock Gloves Like Batman's
What else is the Caped Crusader using?
Factories In The Sky Will Surpass Those Of Earth
'The thirty-odd miles of The Factory’s circumference...'
Sleeper Drones Lie in Wait
'Wandering mines, you took them out on the edge of the desert, set them down and activated them.'
Warfare Goes Underground In Ukraine
'Once in the very first weeks of the war, before everyone had been evacuated from the surface...'
Robot Bees 3D Printed By Festo
'At first I was struck by the large size of these bees..'
3D Printed Organs From Space
'For a while your colonists will have to come up to the [orbital] Hospital...'
DIY Robot Scorpion Crushes It
'...it raised its front end off the ground and waved its antennae at them, then raised one armoured claw as if to snip them out of the sky.'
How To Settle An Argument Between Two Robots
'Henry... assumed the curious absent look of a robot talking on the TBR circuits.'
The Wind Phone Calls Those Who Have Passed On
'Only I heard that!'
