NASA plans to launch a spacecraft to Titan

Re:NASA plans to launch a spacecraft to Titan by zild3d on Friday June 28, 2019 @04:36PM (#20308575)

Inverse square law. For the same transmit power, your received signal strength diminishes with the square of the distance

That received signal strength is what determines channel capacity (C) which is the upper limit on the bit rate you can get.

see Friis and Shannon's channel capacity

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friis_transmission_equation

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shannon%E2%80%93Hartley_theore...

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Re:NASA plans to launch a spacecraft to Titan by martinald on Friday June 28, 2019 @05:33PM (#20308940)

Yes, I get that. But it seems that performance has barely improved since the 1970s despite the massive gains in telecommunication efficiencies since then. Or is the SNR so poor that even 1970s era technology was able to be close to the limit?

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Re:NASA plans to launch a spacecraft to Titan by garmaine on Friday June 28, 2019 @06:09PM (#20309177)

These are physical restrictions, not technological.

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Re:NASA plans to launch a spacecraft to Titan by martinald on Friday June 28, 2019 @07:47PM (#20309787)

What about the laser technology NASA is developing? That should be a lot faster than current radio based technology?

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Re:NASA plans to launch a spacecraft to Titan by greglindahl on Friday June 28, 2019 @08:11PM (#20309915)

Titan has smog in the visible spectrum. Details matter! The technology is also not that mature, yet.

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Re:NASA plans to launch a spacecraft to Titan by nradov on Saturday June 29, 2019 @12:36AM (#20310830)

Focusing a laser at that range requires a rather large diameter heavy set of optical components.

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Re:NASA plans to launch a spacecraft to Titan by anticensor on Sunday June 30, 2019 @05:45PM (#20320729)

You will need a blinding-strong laser.

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