For the last few week since its launching , the experimental LightSail satellite has been orbit Earth , unable to make background touch thanks to a software bug . But earlier today , the space vehicle ’s handlers successfully deployed the little craft ’s gigantic sail .
Motor is running ! Sail is Deploying ! ! ! 39 year after Prof. Sagan spoke of it !
— Bill Nye ( @BillNye)June 7 , 2015

LightSail is an data-based project , funded by The Planetary Society , a non - government organization founded by Carl Sagan in 1980 , presently boasting our planet ’s very own Science Guy as CEO . LightSail is a project aimed at test the technical and economic benefits of solar sails , which use sunlight to prompt themselves through the vacuum of space .
The LightSail craft that ’s presently in celestial orbit is too humiliated to let for actual sailing , since the satellite will be caught in atmospheric puff . rather , it ’s meant to prove things like deployment and communications , in planning for a full mission next year .
Solar sail technology is n’t particularly unexampled , having already been test by the Americans and Japanese . What LightSail is promising , though , is low - budget space exploration . The LightSail craft is made up of CubeSats , bantam satellites weighing about three pound each . LightSail has three of those , and a Brobdingnagian Mylar canvass covering 344 square feet . That make it gaudy — $ 4.5 million for the whole delegation .

[ The Planetary Society ]
get in touch with the writer at[email protect ] .
Top image: Artist’s concept of the LightSail microsatellite. Credit:The Planetary Society/Mika McKinnon
Bill NyeScienceSpace
Daily Newsletter
Get the best tech , science , and culture news in your inbox daily .
News from the future , give up to your nowadays .
Please take your desired newssheet and submit your email to upgrade your inbox .

You May Also Like












![]()
