Related papers: High Speed AB-Solar Sail
Minor bodies of the solar system can be used to measure the spectrum of the Sun as a star by observing sunlight reflected by their surfaces. To perform an accurate measurement of the radial velocity of the Sun as a star by this method, it…
Fast (>700 km/s) and slow (~400 km/s) winds stream from the Sun, permeate the heliosphere and influence the near-Earth environment. While the fast wind is known to emanate primarily from polar coronal holes, the source of the slow wind…
Microwave propelled sails are a new class of spacecraft using photon acceleration. It is the only method of interstellar flight that has no physics issues. Laboratory demonstrations of basic features of beam-driven propulsion, flight,…
Advanced solar sailing has been an increasingly attractive propulsion system for highly non-Keplerian orbits. Three new applications of the orbital angular momentum reversal (H-reversal) trajectories using solar sails are presented in this…
In this paper, we explore from a conceptual standpoint the possibility of using natural astrophysical sources to accelerate spacecrafts to relativistic speeds. We focus on light sails and electric sails, which are reliant on momentum…
Solar flares signify the sudden release of magnetic energy and are sources of so called space weather. The fine structures (below 500 km) of flares are rarely observed and are accessible to only a few instruments world-wide. Here we present…
Current sheet is believed to be the region of energy dissipation via magnetic reconnection in solar flares. However, its properties, for example, the dynamic process, have not been fully understood. Here we report a current sheet in a solar…
The Solar Wind Around Pluto (SWAP) instrument on NASA's New Horizon Pluto mission has collected solar wind observations en route from Earth to Pluto, and these observations continue beyond Pluto. Few missions have explored the solar wind in…
Doppler imaging spectroscopy is the most reliable way to directly measure wind speeds of planetary atmospheres of the Solar system. However, most knowledge about atmospheric dynamics has been obtained with cloud-tracking technique, which…
Solar flares are sudden flashes of brightness on the Sun and are often associated with coronal mass ejections and solar energetic particles which have adverse effects in the near Earth environment. By definition, flares are usually referred…
It is well known that the solar gravitational field can be considered as a telescope with a prime focus at locations beyond 550 au. In this work we present a new derivation of the wave-optical properties of the system, by adapting the…
In the corona, plasma is accelerated to hundreds of kilometers per second, and heated to temperatures hundreds of times hotter than the Sun's surface, before it escapes to form the solar wind. Decades of space-based experiments have shown…
Compared to the Sun, the atmospheric structure and convective flow in Procyon A exhibit the following characteristics: (1) the highly superadiabatic transition layer (SAL) is located at much shallower optical depth; it is in a dynamically…
Sunspots are concentrations of magnetic field visible on the solar surface (photosphere). It was considered implausible that solar flares, as resulted from magnetic reconnection in the tenuous corona, would cause a direct perturbation of…
The Solar Close Observations and Proximity Experiments (SCOPE) mission will send a spacecraft into the solar atmosphere at a low altitude of just 5 R_sun from the solar center. It aims to elucidate the mechanisms behind solar eruptions and…
Helioseismology revealed an increase in the rotation rate with depth just beneath the solar surface. The relative magnitude of the radial shear is almost constant with latitude. This rotational state can be interpreted as a consequence of…
Statistical classification of the Helios solar wind observations into several populations sorted by bulk speed has revealed an outward acceleration of the wind. The faster the wind is, the smaller is this acceleration in the 0.3 - 1 au…
The properties of the solar wind, as measured in situ throughout the heliosphere, depend both on the characteristics of its coronal source and on the intrinsic processes governing its interplanetary evolution. Recently, radial and Parker…
We propose to use metasurfaces as a mean of controlling radiation pressure for increasing the range of motions of spacecraft solar sails. Specifically, we present a theoretical study of different electromagnetic field configurations, and…
Convection is the mechanism by which energy is transported through the outermost 30% of the Sun. Solar turbulent convection is notoriously difficult to model across the entire convection zone where the density spans many orders of…