“As future science instruments and imaging systems incorporate the latest technology advancements, they’ll return very large volumes of data on a daily basis,” said Jason Mitchell, Director of the Advanced Communications and Navigation Technology division within NASA’s Space Communications and Navigation ( SCaN) program. The addition of laser communications to spacecraft is similar to switching from dial-up to high-speed internet. With a single seven-minute pass at 200 Gbit/s, TBIRD will send back terabytes of data and give NASA more insight into the capabilities of laser communications.

“TBIRD is a game changer and will be very important for future human exploration and science missions.” said Andreas Doulaveris, TBIRD’s mission systems engineer at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. Laser communications substantially increases data transport capabilities, offering higher data rates and more information packed into a single transmission. With more data, researchers can make profound discoveries. NASA primarily uses radio frequency to communicate with spacecraft, but with sights set on human exploration of the Moon and Mars and the development of enhanced scientific instruments, NASA needs more efficient communications systems to transmit significant amounts of data. (Not drawn to scale), image credits: NASA/Dave Ryan Figure 1: Illustration of TBIRD downlinking data over lasers links to Optical Ground Station 1 in California.

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