Japan’s space agency has released the first complete images of the ‘solar sail’ it deployed earlier this month.

The images were taken by a ‘separation camera’ that was ejected from the Ikaros spacecraft by means of a spring. After taking its images and transmitting them back to Ikaros, the camera will be lost (press release).

As Nature’s David Cyranoski wrote earlier this month:

Ikaros will be propelled by photons from the Sun hitting the sail. The idea is decades old, but this will be the first experimental verification. JAXA scientists will now be trying to steer the craft and measuring its slow but steady acceleration. Based on what they learn, JAXA hopes later this decade to power missions to Jupiter and the Trojan asteroids with a “medium-size” sail some 1250 meters squared in area, combined with ion-propulsion engines.