The Newest Wi-Fi Hotspot Is Literally Out Of This World – It’s On The Moon

Astronauts can finally post their selfies and the filter-heavy pictures of NASA-designed ‘food’ on Instagram right from the Moon. According to Discover Magazine, scientists from NASA’s Lincoln Laboratory and MIT have shown that it’s possible to beam a wireless Internet signal across the approximate distance of 386243 KM between the Earth and the Moon. This means it is possible for Moon dwellers to experience Wi-Fi connectivity that is similar to what we enjoy here on Earth, with the possibility of large data transfers and high-definition video streaming now within the reach.

“This will be the first time that we present both the implementation overview and how well it actually worked,” said Mark Stevens of MIT Lincoln Laboratory while speaking to the OSA. “The on-orbit performance was excellent and close to what we’d predicted, giving us confidence that we have a good understanding of the underlying physics,” he added.

According to Discover Magazine, to achieve this feat, scientists used four separate telescopes based in New Mexico to send an uplink signal to a receiver mounted on a satellite orbiting the Moon.

The Earth’s atmosphere bends the signal as it travels to the Moon – so the four telescopes transmit the light through separate columns of air, each with unique bending effects. This increases the probability of at least one of the laser beams interacting with the receiver, thus successfully establishing a connection with the Moon.

Now on to the most important question – what about the speed? While transmitting data from the Earth to the Moon, the team achieved a speed of 19.44 megabits per second, which is pretty impressive and comparable to slower broadband speeds. However, when downloading information from the Moon, a speed of 622 megabits per second was achieved, which is quite remarkable for a connection across the vast distances of space.