If seeing is believing, this picture comes as sweet relief to a
satellite operations team in Japan that has been overseeing the
flight of an experimental solar sailing spacecraft. The Japanese
Aerospace Exploration Agency, known as JAXA, captured the image
after the IKAROS spacecraft deployed a small camera last week.
The picture was released on JAXA’s website Thursday. IKAROS — an
acronym for Interplanetary Kite-craft Accelerated by Radiation
Of the Sun — was launched May 21 to test how a very thin, very
large membrane can be used much like a sail on ship. Rather than
wind, the craft relies on the slight but ever-present force of
photons from the sun. The idea for solar sailing dates back more
than 100 years ago and there have been several attempts to test
the technology in space. IKAROS, with its 20-meter diagonal
sail, is the most ambitious mission to date. IKAROS also draws
electricity from thin film solar cells embedded into the sail,
power that can be used to operate an ion propulsion engine for
added a