Written by Amira Shehata Friday, November 24, 2023 03:00 AM NASA is preparing to establish a two-way laser communications system on the International Space Station, and earlier this month, NASA sent a laser communications station to… International Space Station To test how high-speed lasers can be used in low orbit, but what is the difference between using lasers and radio signals to transmit data in space and why is NASA seeking to turn to lasers?
According to what the British newspaper “Daily Mail” reported, current satellites use radio signals to communicate, receive commands, and return data to control units. Radio waves and lasers are two types of electromagnetic radiation that can pass through the vacuum of space at the speed of light.
But the difference is that since infrared light is a high-frequency wave, NASA’s new laser communications system can transmit more information per second.
An aviation laser transceiver takes data in bits, encodes it into the photons that make up the laser, and back on Earth, the signal is received by an array of highly efficient superconducting detectors that identify individual photons as they arrive and decode the data.
While the signal travels at the speed of light, the large distances involved make it difficult to accurately transmit a laser signal to a receiver on Earth, so the agency is working to create a system that will enable it and bring the better technological benefits of lasers.
Perhaps the ultimate goal is to integrate lasers into the entire communications system to build a faster and more reliable network in space.
