Once again, NASA has proven that lasers are one of the coolest technologies we’ve got. After three years of development, researchers from the space agency and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are set to unveil the results of their first tests using lasers to transmit information to and from the moon.
The test apparently achieved upload speeds of 19.44 megabits per second and download speeds of 622 megabits per second over the 384,633km between Earth and the moon; faster, the Optical Society said, than any conventional (read: radio) method of transmitting data between here and the blue-black infinity of space. 19.44 megabits per second is more than fast enough to stream high-definition TV, movies and video chat.
On the more scientific side of things, those speeds will allow for larger and better satellite imaging in real time. Netflix, of course, is highly scientific.
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