A view of Jupiter's moon Europa captured by NASA's Juno mission during its Sept. 29 close flyby at the moon. The spacecraft was 945 miles above the moon's surface when the image was taken.Solar sails, which harness sunlight as sailboats harness the wind, could be affordable probes in the search for alien life on at least two icy moons in our solar system — Jupiter's Europa and Saturn's Enceladus, a new study suggests.
The push given by light particles is slight but continuous, meaning they can eventually accelerate a solar-sailing probe to speeds unattainable with conventional rockets, which are heavier thanks to the propellant they carry — a problem that increases with the size of the spacecraft. Solar sails, however, gain momentum from the sunlight they capture, so"they don't have to carry their fuel onboard," said Lingam.
When performing flybys through these plumes, high spacecraft speeds would lead to the particles striking a probe relatively hard, meaning"the molecules can be destroyed, and that, in turn, can destroy any signs of putative life," said Lingam. To avoid that, a solar sailing mission should be capable of reducing its speed to the minimum encounter velocity of about 6 kilometers per second , Lingam and his team report in their newThis particular space technology is not unheard of.
After 65 years of exploring our solar system with conventional rocket technology,"at some point, we're going to encounter the limits of what can be explored with chemical propulsion," said Lingam. Solar sail technology could very well herald a new era of space exploration, he added, especially if it's going to be well-suited to search for signs of life in places"considered among the most promising habitats for life.
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