About
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New Space Race
An international competition designed to accelerate the development of solar sailing propulsion in SmallSat Sail-propelled Spacecraft race from GEO to Mars
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Build
Up to 8 University teams will design and build CubeSat-class spacecraft constrained only by mass, volume, and propulsion requirement of only relying upon solar radiation pressure.
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Fly
A Mars race, driven by multiple solar-sail spacecraft serves as a modern grand challenge to push new frontiers in materials and automation technologies
Objective:
The objective is simple: reach Mars in the shortest possible time.
Up to eight CubeSat-class spacecraft, constrained only by pre-deployment mass, volume, and the requirement to rely solely on solar radiation pressure for propulsion, will compete in this high-stakes interplanetary challenge.
University teams must design and operate fully autonomous spacecraft, optimizing sail orientation and momentum transfer to navigate a heliocentric trajectory—maximizing acceleration toward Mars. Teams will include a camera, first team to image Mars with the sun in view, wins.
New Horizons
Beyond the race, SRC serves as a structured platform for advancing solar sailing technology, an underdeveloped yet promising method of interplanetary propulsion.
By enabling real-world flight testing, SRC fosters hands-on experimentation, algorithm refinement, and iterative hardware improvements.
Future editions will introduce an Unrestricted Class, allowing exploration of emerging concepts such as beamed energy propulsion and coordinated sail formations, potentially revolutionizing deep-space logistics.