Communication with spacecraft is vital for NASA, and since the World Wide Web has enabled easy, reliable and quick contact for people around the world, the space agency decided to model a new deep space communication system on the internet. A month-long test of this "Interplanetary Internet" was successfully conducted by transmitting dozens of images to and from the EPOXI spacecraft, now about 20 million miles from Earth. The system uses software called Disruption-Tolerant Networking, or DTN created by a partnership between NASA and Google vice president Vint Cerf. "This is the first step in creating a totally new space communications capability, an interplanetary Internet," said Adrian Hooke, team lead and manager of space-networking architecture, technology and standards at NASA Headquarters in Washington.
Source: Universe Today
Astronauts of the future will now have no excuse for not answering their email...
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