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brcmthrowaway 2 days ago

How does laser communication work with a moving object with 9DoF?!

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sbarre 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

Apparently with a gimbal and some fast-moving mirrors.

https://www.ll.mit.edu/news/lincoln-laboratory-laser-communi...

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beloch 2 days ago | parent [-]

It also helps that laser beams diverge. By the time it gets back to Earth, the diameter of the beam from Artemis is probably several hundred meters, if not several kilometres. Their aim still needs to be fairly precise, but they're not trying to hit a lens with a beam that's still the width of a pencil. They really just need to paint the neighbourhood that NASA's sensors are located in.

	▲	groby_b 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		6 km ([slide show](https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/20250009875/downloads/Op...) with data points and the worst slides government agencies were able to create)

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functional_dev 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I was wondering about this too! I did not know how they can aim a laser from so far at a moving spaceship.

I generated this visual map about to help me understand it - https://vectree.io/c/aiming-space-lasers-gimbals-and-beam-di...

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kotaKat 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

Just like this, a Starlink gimbal being tested for future third party laser comms: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpFfC9WY0qs

	▲	brcmthrowaway a day ago \| parent [-]
		Doesnt look very precise.