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NASA successfully received a laser message from the asteroid Psyche (Psyche), located at a distance of 226 million kilometers from Earth. This became part of the mission to study this unique asteroid.
During the trip, the team tested an innovative optical communication system that uses infrared lasers instead of radio waves. Data was transmitted at a speed of 25 Mbit/s, significantly exceeding the expected minimum speed of 1 Mbit/s and proving to be 10 to 100 times faster than traditional radio transmissions.
According to Meera Srinivasan of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, this is a significant advance in using optical communication to supplement existing radio communications in space. During previous tests, the spacecraft was closer to Earth, but this time the technology showed its advantages at a record distance.
"We've learned a lot about how far we can push the system when we have clear skies, although storms have interrupted work at times at both Table Mountain and Palomar," said Ryan Rogalin, the project's receiver electronics lead at JPL.
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
The NASA team plans to further test the system in June, when Psyche will be even further from Earth, at a distance 2,5 times the distance between Earth and the Sun, which could open up opportunities to generate data between Earth and Mars. Source
