First flight demonstration of glass-type space solar sheet

Shimazaki, Kazunori*; Kobayashi, Yuki*; Takahashi, Masato*; Imaizumi, Mitsuru*; Murashima, Mio*; Takahashi, Yu*; Toyota, Hiroyuki*; Kukita, Akio*; Oshima, Takeshi; Sato, Shinichiro; Takamoto, Tatsuya*; Kusawake, Hiroaki*

The electrical performance of a glass-type space solar sheet (G-SSS) was demonstrated in space. G-SSS comprises InGaP/GaAs dual-junction and InGaP/GaAs/InGaAs triplejunction solar cells. It is lightweight solar generation sheet, less than 0.5 mm thick. It is mounted on the "HISAKI" (SPRINT-A) small scientific satellite, which was launched on September 14, 2013. The initial flight data were successfully acquired and this flight demonstration was a world-first experiment for G-SSS using III-V multi-junction thin-film solar cells. The cells demonstrated superior performance and the electrical outputs matched the flight prediction.