In this infrared photograph taken on June 2, 2025, the Optical Communications Telescope Laboratory at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s Table Mountain Facility near Wrightwood, California, beams its eight-laser beacon to the Deep Space Optical Communications (DSOC) flight laser transceiver aboard NASA’s Psyche spacecraft. At the time, when Psyche was about 143 million miles (230 million kilometers) from Earth.
Managed by JPL, DSOC successfully demonstrated that data encoded in laser photons could be reliably transmitted, received, and then decoded after traveling millions of miles from Earth out to Mars distances. Nearly two years after launching aboard the agency’s Psyche mission in 2023, the demonstration completed its 65th and final “pass” on Sept. 2, 2025, sending a laser signal to Psyche and receiving the return signal from 218 million miles (350 million kilometers) away.
Text credit: Ian J. O’Neill
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
在这张红外照片中，拍摄于2025年6月2日，美国加州赖特伍德附近、位于NASA喷气推进实验室（JPL）桌山（Table Mountain）设施的光通信望远镜实验室向灵神星号（Psyche）探测器上的深空光通信系统（DSOC）激光收发器发出八束激光信标。当时，灵神星号距离地球约1.43亿英里（2.3亿公里）。
由JPL管理的DSOC项目成功验证了以下技术：将数据编码进激光光子，并在从地球传播至火星轨道的数百万英里距离后，依然能够可靠地接收与解码。自2023年搭载灵神星任务发射以来，近两年后，DSOC于2025年9月2日完成其第65次、也是最后一次通信尝试——在与地球相距2.18亿英里（3.5亿公里）时，成功发送激光信号至探测器并接收其回传。
文字来源: Ian J. O’Neill
图片来源: NASA/JPL-Caltech
