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Deep Space Optical Communications (DSOC) is a
laser space communication system in operation that improved communications performance 10 to 100 times over
radio frequency
Radio frequency (RF) is the oscillation rate of an alternating electric current or voltage or of a magnetic, electric or electromagnetic field or mechanical system in the frequency range from around to around . This is roughly between the u ...
technology without incurring increases in mass, volume or power.
[ DSOC is capable of providing high ]bandwidth
Bandwidth commonly refers to:
* Bandwidth (signal processing) or ''analog bandwidth'', ''frequency bandwidth'', or ''radio bandwidth'', a measure of the width of a frequency range
* Bandwidth (computing), the rate of data transfer, bit rate or thr ...
downlinks from beyond cislunar space.
The project is led by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory
The Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) is a Federally funded research and development centers, federally funded research and development center (FFRDC) in La Cañada Flintridge, California, Crescenta Valley, United States. Founded in 1936 by Cali ...
(JPL) in Pasadena, California
Pasadena ( ) is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States, northeast of downtown Los Angeles. It is the most populous city and the primary cultural center of the San Gabriel Valley. Old Pasadena is the city's original commerci ...
. In April 2024, the system successfully communicated with the Psyche spacecraft at a distance of 140 million miles.
Overview
Future human expeditions may require a steady stream of high-definition imagery, live video feeds, and real-time data transmission across deep space to enable timely guidance and updates during the long-distance journeys.Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter
The ''Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter'' (''MRO'') is a spacecraft designed to search for the existence of water on Mars and provide support for missions to Mars, as part of NASA's Mars Exploration Program. It was launched from Cape Canaveral on Au ...
(MRO) requires 7.5 hours to transmit all of its onboard recorder, and 1.5 hours to send a single HiRISE image to be processed back on Earth. New high-resolution hyperspectral imagers put further demands on their communications system, requiring even higher data rates. was launched in 2023 on board NASA's robotic
''Psyche'' mission to study the giant metal asteroid known as
16 Psyche
16 Psyche ( ) is a large M-type asteroid, which was discovered by the Italian astronomer Annibale de Gasparis, on 17 March 1852 and named after the Greek goddess Psyche.
The prefix "16" signifies that it was the sixteenth minor plane ...
. The laser beams from the spacecraft will be received by the 200 inch (5 m)
Hale Telescope
The Hale Telescope is a , 3.3 reflecting telescope at the Palomar Observatory in San Diego County, California, US, named after astronomer George Ellery Hale. With funding from the Rockefeller Foundation in 1928, he orchestrated the planning, de ...
at
Palomar Observatory
The Palomar Observatory is an astronomical research observatory in the Palomar Mountains of San Diego County, California, United States. It is owned and operated by the California Institute of Technology (Caltech). Research time at the observat ...
in California.
[ ] Laser beams to the spacecraft will be sent from a smaller telescope at the
Table Mountain Observatory
Table Mountain Observatory (TMO) is an Observatory, astronomical observation facility operated by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (California Institute of Technology). It is located in Big Pines, California, in the Angeles National Forest near Wr ...
in California.
First light was achieved on 14 November 2023.
The first video successfully beamed from space using the technology occurred on 11 December, 2023 from a record-setting 19 million miles away (31 million kilometers, or about 80 times the Earth-Moon distance).
Design
This new technology will employ advanced
laser
A laser is a device that emits light through a process of optical amplification based on the stimulated emission of electromagnetic radiation. The word ''laser'' originated as an acronym for light amplification by stimulated emission of radi ...
s in the
near-infrared region (1.55 μm
) of the
electromagnetic spectrum
The electromagnetic spectrum is the full range of electromagnetic radiation, organized by frequency or wavelength. The spectrum is divided into separate bands, with different names for the electromagnetic waves within each band. From low to high ...
.
The architecture is based on transmitting a laser beacon from Earth to assist line-of-sight stabilization and pointing back of the downlink laser beam. In addition, efficient codes are used for error free communications. The system must correct for background noise (scattered light) from Earth's atmosphere and the Sun.
Given the current hardware (1 m ground transmit, 5 m ground receive, 22 cm spacecraft telescope), the uplink is expected to reach 292 kbit/s at a distance of , with the downlink reaching 100 Mbit/s at the same distance.
[Deep Space Optical Communications (DSOC)]
(PDF). Overview Poster. Biswas NASA July 2014. The transmitted beam-width is inversely proportional to the frequency used, so the shorter the wavelength used, the narrower and more focused a beam can be made.
The downlink bandwidth will depend on the ground telescope diameter and will be less during daytime.
[
Three key DSOC technologies developed for the project include:][
A Deep Space Optical Communication demonstration is included with NASA's ''Psyche'' mission, launched on October 13, 2023. The ''Psyche'' spacecraft will explore the metal asteroid ]16 Psyche
16 Psyche ( ) is a large M-type asteroid, which was discovered by the Italian astronomer Annibale de Gasparis, on 17 March 1852 and named after the Greek goddess Psyche.
The prefix "16" signifies that it was the sixteenth minor plane ...
, reaching the asteroid belt in 2029.
See also
*
References
{{Lasers
Laser communication in space