NASA receives laser and radio messages from space: summary

What we know

• NASA’s experimental antenna, Deep Space Station 13 at its Goldstone complex in California has received both frequency and near-infrared laser signals from deep space at the same time. This indicates a possibility for NASA’s giant dish antennas which communicate with spacecraft through radio waves to be modified for optical or laser communications.
• This follows months of Psyche spacecraft to test a new communication system. It was first tested in November when a laser signal was detected from 10 million miles away. The tech demo’s flight laser transceiver is riding with the agency’s Psyche spacecraft, which launched on Oct. 13, 2023.
• The Deep Space Network (DSN) antenna downlinked data from 20 million miles (32 million kilometres) away, about 40 times faster than radio frequency communications at that distance, and downlinked a team photograph that had been uploaded before Psyche’s launch in January 2024.
• Ultra-precise segmented mirrors were attached to the inside of a hybrid antenna to detect the laser’s photons (quantum particles of light). The laser signal collected by the camera is then transmitted through an optical fibre that feeds into a cryogenically cooled semiconducting nanowire single photon detector.
• NASA’s Deep Space Optical Communications (DSOC) is creating space for higher-data-rate communications that can transmit complex scientific information, video, and high-definition images ahead of the quest to send human beings to Mars.

What they said

Deep Station Network Deputy Manager at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Southern California said, “Our hybrid antenna has been able to successfully and reliably lock onto and track the DSOC downlink since shortly after the tech demo launched. It also received Psyche’s radio frequency signal, so we have demonstrated synchronous radio and optical frequency deep space communications for the first time,” Amy Smith said. Barzia Tehrani who is Communications Ground Systems Deputy Manager and Delivery Manager for the hybrid antenna at JPL said, “It’s a high-tolerance optical system built on a 34-meter flexible structure”.