ESA engineers are looking at using the world's thinnest known material to build lighter, more efficient solar sails. By making sails out of one-atom-thick graphene sheets, the space agency aims to ...

Tom Whidden is one of those lucky and rare fellows who has successfully carved a career out of a passion. At the tender age of 18, Mr. Whidden decided that he wanted to be a sail maker, an activity ...

There has been huge progress on laser pushed sails. Laser pushed sails appear to be a path to sending probes up to 20% of the speed of light when we can make 1 gram sails that are one to two meters on ...

If you have been dreaming of traveling to another star system, researchers say you may need to use a sail. Penn Engineering and UCLA researchers show that light sails could provide interstellar ...

Racing sails made of laminated materials have been the choice of leading-edge racers for nearly a quarter century. These sails, assembled from panels built of high-strength fibers sandwiched within ...

In a nutshell: NASA announced it is prepared to launch a "next-gen" solar sailor into orbit. The Advanced Composite Solar Sail System (ACS3) is a newly designed satellite meant to test the deployment ...

Sailboat racing, and the sailing industry at large, is anything but green despite being a sport powered by wind. Hulls, sails, cordage and most components are largely derived from fossil fuels, and ...

YEAR. IN THE LAST BIG ONE THAT WE BUILT, WE USED PRESS RINGS, YOU MIGHT SAY BEN SPERRY FOUND HIMSELF HERE VERY MUCH BY ACCIDENT. IT WAS IN THE SKIING INDUSTRY AND BROKE MY LEG REALLY BADLY OUT WEST ...

A new study examines structural buckling as a control method for solar sails, detailing kirigami cuts, simulations, and experiments to adjust spacecraft orientation efficiently.

Since the acquisition and integration of Incidence Technologies in 2013, Incidence Sails has had an impressive and integrated design office, producing its own membranes. Thanks to the company’s ...