Communicating Via Long-Distance Lasers

Visible light has been used to communicate for centuries. Lanterns on ships and Morse code flashes allowed information to be conveyed at a distance. But now there's a better way to use light to communicate over even further distances and with far more accuracy: lasers.

Launching in 2021, NASA's Laser Communications Relay Demonstration (LCRD) is going to geostationary orbit, where it will communicate with the ground at gigabit speeds. It's the agency's latest step to get more data from space per downlink. Currently, most NASA missions use radio frequency communications to send data to and from spacecraft. Radio waves have been used in space communications since the beginning of space exploration and have a proven track record of success. However, as space missions generate and collect more data, the need for enhanced communications capabilities becomes paramount.