* Astronomy

Blobrana · L

RE: IKAROS mission

Blobrana · L

IKAROS (Interplanetary Kite-craft Accelerated by Radiation Of the Sun) is a Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) experimental spacecraft. The spacecraft was launched on 21 May, 2010, aboard an H-IIA rocket, together with the Akatsuki (Venus Climate Orbiter) probe and four other small spacecraft.
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Blobrana · L

Spoiler

Blobrana · L

It's the trailblazer of solar sailing. Japan's IKAROS spacecraft has used "smart glass" technology to steer using only the pressure of sunlight - a first for solar sails.
IKAROS launched in MayMovie Camera and soon after became the first solar sail to be fully propelled by sunlight. Now liquid crystal devices along the outer edge of the sail have been used to steer the craft. The devices control the reflectivity of the outer sections of the sail; switching one on creates a mirror-like effect, allowing sunlight to push more on those parts of the sail.
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Blobrana · L

The world's first solar sale spacecraft IKAROS is becoming increasingly popular both at home and abroad, with some 34,000 people following the animated "IKAROS-kun" character on Twitter.
IKAROS was launched on May 21 together with the "Akatsuki" Venus climate orbiter.
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Blobrana · L

The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) said Wednesday that Ikaros, its small solar-powered "space yacht," has observed a gamma-ray burst resulting from the explosion of a massive star.
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Blobrana · L

Mini-camera pictures Japan's Ikaros solar sail

It is the picture that confirms Japan's Ikaros solar sail is fully extended and ready for the next part of its mission.
The image was acquired by a tiny camera ejected from the central hub of Ikaros.
It transmitted the picture back to the central hub of the spacecraft, which then relayed the data many millions of kilometres to Earth.
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Blobrana · L

Japan unfurls Ikaros solar sail in space

Japanese scientists are celebrating the successful deployment of their solar sail, Ikaros.
The 200-sq-m membrane is attached to a small disc-shaped spacecraft that was put in orbit last month by an H-IIA rocket.
Ikaros will demonstrate the principle of using sunlight as a simple and efficient means of propulsion.
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Blobrana · L

The IKAROS spacecraft has successfully unfurled the solar sail. This is the first demonstration of the new space propulsion technology using only sunlight to propel the spacecraft.

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Blobrana · L

An H-2A rocket carrying Japan's first Venus climate probe and five other satellites successfully blasted off from Tanegashima Space Centre on Tanegashima island, Kagoshima Prefecture, early Friday.
The rocket was launched by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd. at 6:58 a.m.
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