DARPA plans thousands-strong satellite constellation Space-BACN sandwich

DARPA, the famously scattershot defence research agency of people's hearts, has turned its attention to recent announcements of planned and actual communications satellite constellation launches, asking: "Why can't these things all just talk to each other?" The agency – which recently asked US defence contractors if they fancy …

[John Brown (no body)]

Piiiiigs in Spaaaaace!

Sorry, but someone was going to post that at some stage, so it it might as well be me :-)

And I got to be first post too!!

It all sounds like a good idea to standardise space comms though.

[eldakka]

Space-BACN?

This doesn't sound kosher.

[herman]

Re: Space-BACN?

It sure won’t work in the Middle East

[Empire of the Pussycat]

"a low-cost optical aperture which can utilise all infra-red wavelengths in the C band"

My proposal is a hole in the side of the box, wonder if I could get DARPA funding to develop the concept? Hmm.

[Trigonoceps occipitalis]

Re: "a low-cost optical aperture which can utilise all infra-red wavelengths in the C band"

Prior Art - they tried that on the ISS.

[VeganVegan]

Am i missing something?

“ low-cost optical aperture which can utilise all infra-red wavelengths in the C band”

My understanding is that C band is in the centimeter range, with 7.5 - 3.75 cm wavelength.

IR is from ~700 nanometer to 1 millimeter. Far IR is roughly in the micron range, something like <100 micron wavelength.

And never the twain shall meet?

Anyhoo, IR is good for cooking bacon.

[herman]

Re: Am i missing something?

Yup, you are missing something : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C_band_(infrared)

[Homeboy]

If the US military can piggy back on tens of thousands of commercial satellites to improve the redundancy of its networks then, to me, that sounds like a great idea. Disabling your opponents space infrastructure will be a key early stage in any major conflict. Making that very hard to do will give any aggressor pause for thought.