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Published November 2, 1998 | Published
Book Section - Chapter Open

Solar Polar Sail mission: report of a study to put a scientific spacecraft in a circular polar orbit about the sun

Abstract

The Solar Polar Sail Mission uses solar-sail propulsion to place a spacecraft in a circular orbit 0.48 Au from the Sun with an inclination of 90 degrees. The spacecraft's orbit around the Sun is in 3:1 resonance with Earth phased such that the Earth-Sun-spacecraft angle range from 30 degrees to 150 degrees. The polar view will further our understanding of: (1) the global structure and evolution of the corona, (2) the initiation, evolution, and propagation of coronal mass ejections; (3) the acceleration of the solar wind; (4) the interactions of rotation, magnetic fields, and convection within the Sun; (5) the acceleration and propagation of energetic particles; and (6) the rate of angular momentum loss by the Sun. Candidate imaging instruments are a coronagraph, an all-sky imager for following mass ejections and interaction regions from the Sun to 1 AU, and a disk imager. A lightweight package of fields and particle instruments is included. A mission using a 158 m square sail with an effective areal density of 6 g/m^2 would cost approximately $250-300M (FY97) for all mission phases, including the launch vehicle. This mission depends on the successful development and demonstration of solar-sail propulsion.

Additional Information

© 1998 Society of Photo-optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE). Engineering support was provided to the study by R. A. Wallace, J. Ayon, C. E. Garner, C. Sauer, C.-W. Yen, and the Advanced Projects Design Team (Team X) led by R. Bennett. A portion of this work was conducted at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

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August 19, 2023
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