Bridging the Cosmic Divide: Free Space Laser Communications for Satellites, Moon, and Mars

  For decades, radio frequency (RF) communication has been the lifeline of space exploration. From the faint signals of Sputnik to the continuous data streaming from the Perseverance rover on Mars, radio waves have carried humanity’s voice into the cosmos. But as our missions grow more ambitious—high-definition video from the Moon, vast sensor datasets from…