Advansments in tech. to explore mars

" laser that can beam data from Mars to Earth at 10 times the rate of current radio links will be sent to the Red Planet in 2009, say NASA scientists. The laser will be the first test of such technology in deep space and may usher in a new era of space communication.
NASA's Mars Odyssey spacecraft currently boasts the highest data transmission rate at 128,000 bits per second. The new laser will beam back between one million and 30 million bits per second, depending on the distance between Mars and Earth.
That leap in capacity is due to the different wavelengths of light carrying the data. The laser will use infrared light with a wavelength of 1.06 microns, which is thousands of times shorter than radio waves. Since all light travels at the same speed through space, shorter wavelengths carry more information in the same time."
ref:www.newscientist.com...

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