Two Military Satellites Just Communicated With Each Other Using Space Lasers 51
Two satellites recently exchanged more than 200 gigabits of data over a distance of about 60 miles (100 kilometers) using laser communication in space. Gizmodo reports: Satellites generally don't communicate directly with each other. Instead, they use radio signals to transfer data down to a ground station on Earth, which then relays this data to another satellite. Optical terminals between satellites are considered to be faster and more secure. CACI International -- the company that developed the optical terminals for the space lasers -- announced the achievement on Tuesday in a press release. The two satellites, named Able and Baker, were launched last summer by the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency as part of its Blackjack project. DARPA is seeking to build a constellation of small satellites in low Earth orbit for the purpose of supporting military operations.
The two satellites successfully pulled off the 40-minute laser communications experiment on April 14, during which time Able and Baker used CACI's CrossBeam free-space optical terminals. Infrared lasers transmit data by encoding the message into an optical signal, which is then carried to a receiver. The experiment, known as Mandrake 2, was funded by the Space Development Agency (SDA) and the Air Force Research Laboratory. Mandrake 2 launched on June 30, 2021 as an early risk-reduction flight for DARPA's Blackjack constellation project. The Blackjack constellation aims to deploy an initial batch of 20 small satellites in low Earth orbit, which will connect with each other to form a mesh network in space.
The idea is not to rival commercial satellite constellations such as SpaceX's Starlink, but rather to have a government-owned constellation that the military can use to connect to its bases, sensors, and weapons across the world. The SDA is planning to launch the 20 satellites this fall and then launch an additional 126 satellites by 2024, according to SpaceNews. The agency is seeking to create a full constellation that would include somewhere between 300 and 500 satellites in low Earth orbit. The satellites are being developed by Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and York Space.
The two satellites successfully pulled off the 40-minute laser communications experiment on April 14, during which time Able and Baker used CACI's CrossBeam free-space optical terminals. Infrared lasers transmit data by encoding the message into an optical signal, which is then carried to a receiver. The experiment, known as Mandrake 2, was funded by the Space Development Agency (SDA) and the Air Force Research Laboratory. Mandrake 2 launched on June 30, 2021 as an early risk-reduction flight for DARPA's Blackjack constellation project. The Blackjack constellation aims to deploy an initial batch of 20 small satellites in low Earth orbit, which will connect with each other to form a mesh network in space.
The idea is not to rival commercial satellite constellations such as SpaceX's Starlink, but rather to have a government-owned constellation that the military can use to connect to its bases, sensors, and weapons across the world. The SDA is planning to launch the 20 satellites this fall and then launch an additional 126 satellites by 2024, according to SpaceNews. The agency is seeking to create a full constellation that would include somewhere between 300 and 500 satellites in low Earth orbit. The satellites are being developed by Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and York Space.
news reports in 2026 (Score:2)
In other news, [country X] has apologized for [country Y]'s satellite being vaporized, the problem was blamed on a power spike in an errant comms laser.
Re:news reports in 2026 (Score:4, Insightful)
Having a sense of proportion is useful in evaluating power. Those space lasers aren't even going to make it through the atmosphere.
Re: (Score:3)
I know you are joking but the hardest part of this is dealing with the fact that the laser is quite weak, so to work over long distances with a guide (i.e. a fibre optic cable) it needs to have very good optics that keep it collinear, and an excellent targeting system to point it at the other satellite. The receiver is probably very sensitive too, but needs to be able to filter out stray photons from other sources like the sun.
Re:news reports in 2026 (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:news reports in 2026 (Score:4, Informative)
Huh, it seems so: https://www.universetoday.com/... [universetoday.com]
They used a 1W laser which is quite a bit more than a laser pointer, but still surprisingly small to be seen at that range with the naked eye.
Re: (Score:2)
No, that's silly. None of those beams are going to make it through the atmosphere to get to the concentration point.
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Practically not feasible, because the atmosphere only has a gaping hole in the radio wavelength range that allows electromagnetic waves to pass through it pretty much unhindered.
Anything else, and yes even the visual spectrum (relatively), gets heavily attenuated, resulting in a lot of lost energy to the atmosphere. That would put it in a category of badly written fictional movie supervillain contrivance.
Space Masers on the other hand
Obligatory Real Genius (Score:3)
What do you think a secret phase conjugate tracking system is for?
Re: (Score:1)
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They are just plainly shit at journalism, their job.
Google it.
That's all well and good, but (Score:4, Funny)
What about the sharks?
Re: (Score:3)
This allows them to communicate with satellites. The sharks are said to be thrilled about the fast open sea internet connectivity.
Able and Baker. Seriously? (Score:1)
Lets name our laser "communications" satellites after two nuclear tests carried out at Bikini Atoll.
Re: Able and Baker. Seriously? (Score:2)
No, that's just military speak for A and B...
Re: (Score:2)
It's a military project, and military people use a phonetic alphabet. Would you also be surprised to learn that a third satellite would very probably be named "charlie" ?
Meanwhile on Earth... (Score:1)
AT&T still can't deliver more than 1 megabit to Hollywood.
Re: Meanwhile on Earth... (Score:2)
SpaceX already has this capability (Score:2)
Satellites generally don't communicate directly with each other.
SpaceX has launched over 150 satellites capable of direct laser comms just in the last week, bringing their total close to 1000. The company seems to be well past the research and development phase though I don't think the capability is in use by their Starlink customers quite yet.
Re: (Score:2)
And, you know, has flown a total of zero times.
Re: (Score:3)
Also, 200Gb over 40 minutes works out to about 85Mb/s. It's not a slouch, exactly, but it's not going to be supporting a large squadron of drones any time soon, either.
"Space laser" (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: "Space laser" (Score:3)
No, that's an underwater laser.
Space laser sound more like "pheeyuh, pheeyuh, phe-phr-phe-phe-pheyleyuh!".
Space laser! (Score:2)
I only came here to say this.
Re: (Score:2)
in space no one can hear you laser. unless you're a space shark.
Re: (Score:2)
Pew.Pew.Pew.
Ficken' Sharks (Score:1)
Re: Ficken' Sharks (Score:1)
Jewish Space Lasers? (Score:1)
Re: (Score:1)
Able Baker (Score:2)
Is this part of Operation Crossroads?
Bit rate (Score:2)
"Tightbeam" has arrived ... (Score:2)
... from the pages of The Expanse [wikipedia.org]
Enough with the clickbait (Score:2)
I guess a small minoroty of people. (Score:2)
So was it in Yiddish? (Score:1)
HA ha. Topical humor jokes.
Satellite generally donâ(TM)t communicate wit (Score:3)
I guess the author isnâ(TM)t aware of the Iridium constellation (deployed in 1997), SpaceX Starlink system (in deployment), SES O3b system and the James Webb Space Telescope. All use inter satellite communication. The ka band is widely used for multi gigabit throughput in satellite relay connections.
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Space Lasers... (Score:2)
CLARA: Looks like a Japanese restaurant. Oh! Have you brought me to a space restaurant?
DOCTOR [OC]: People never do that, you know?
CLARA: Do what?
DOCTOR: They never put the word space in front of something just because everything's all sort of hi-tech and future-y. It's never space restaurant or space champagne or space, you know, hat. It's just restaurant, champagne or hat.
(The soldiers follow them as they walk.)
DOCTOR: Even if this was a restaurant
CLARA: What about spacesuit?
DOCTOR: Pedant.
(The Doctor and
Space lasers and Jewish lasers but no Jew+space? (Score:2)
Today Slashdot has an article about Russian Lasers, Space Lasers, and Jewish Lasers (IDF). Yet conspicuously, no article about Jewish Space Lasers! Hmmm!
Which protocol did they use? (Score:2)
Space IRC, Space TCP?