Development of Fuel-free Attitude Control System for Solar Sail To Enable Long-term and Long-distance Deep Space Flight

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The objective of this research is to realize the fuel-free attitude control system for solar sail, which deploys huge thin membrane in space and uses the reflection of sunlight as its propulsive force. We have previously developed a thin-film device that can switch its reflectivity by electric power supply, and in this research, we showed that the device can produce three-axis attitude control torque. We also developed a method to protect the device against long-term severe space environment. The results will lead to a completely fuel-free solar sail spacecraft which does not require any propellant for both orbital control and attitude control.