Abstract
The recent successful flight of the JAXA IKAROS solar sail has renewed interest within NASA in spinning solar sail concepts for high-performance solar sailing. The heliogyro solar sail, in particular, is being re-examined as a potential game-changing architecture for future solar sailing missions. In this paper, we present an overview of ongoing heliogyro technology development and feasibility assessment activities within NASA. In particular, a small-scale heliogyro solar sail technology demonstration concept will be described. We will also discuss ongoing analytical and experimental heliogyro structural dynamics and controls investigations and provide an outline of future heliogyro development work directed toward enabling a low-cost heliogyro technology demonstration mission ca. 2020.
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Acknowledgments
The authors wish to thank the following individuals for their technical assistance and support with this project: P. Douglas Lisman (JPL), Thomas Cleckner (Governor’s School, Hampton, VA), Christopher Savage (NASA, LaRC), R. Wayne Matthews (NASA, LaRC), Thomas Walker (NASA, LaRC), Joel Alexa (NASA, LaRC), Jack Lu (National Institute of Aerospace), Christina Wilson (Wichita State University), and John Thomson (San Diego State University).
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Wilkie, W.K. et al. (2014). Heliogyro Solar Sail Research at NASA. In: Macdonald, M. (eds) Advances in Solar Sailing. Springer Praxis Books(). Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-34907-2_39
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-34907-2_39
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