"The lightsail will travel faster than any previous spacecraft, with potential to eventually open interstellar distances to ...

The idea of a lightsail comes from the fact that radiation pressure represents a mechanical pressure acting on a surface due ...

Powered by laser light, this tiny sail lays the groundwork for future advances in lightsail technology and the potential for ...

To begin their research, the team built a small, tethered lightsail within a larger membrane. They then shined a visible ...

The idea of traveling through interstellar space using spacecraft propelled by ultrathin sails may sound like the stuff of sci-fi novels. But in fact, a program started in 2016 by Stephen Hawking and ...

The ultimate goal of the lightsail project is to drive a freely accelerating lightsail that is 10 square meters in area and 100 nm or less in thickness. In this first experimental step, the Caltech ...

Can lightsails be the future of deep space exploration? This is what a recent study published in Nature Photonics hopes to address as a team of researchers | Space ...

A microscope image of the Caltech team's "miniature trampoline," a tiny lightsail tethered at the corners for direct radiation pressure measurement.