could use the technology to upgrade data options and entertainment capabilities on board, such as video streaming to passengers. Lasercom terminals also could accelerate the exploration of Mars and the rest of the solar system, Chu said. Space missions could obtain higher-quality data and images from these distant planetary destinations while reducing transmission time from weeks or days to hours. Spacecraft could be built differently to accommodate Lasercom. “We see it as the next step for everything,” Chu said. Indeed, brokerage firms could use Lasercom to buy and sell stocks worldwide and faster than ever before, according to Madni. That Lasercom uses frequencies with unrestricted capacity means these brokerage firms would not be limited by today’s federal restrictions in the amount of information being transferred over a certain period of time, a true Wall Street game changer, Madni said. Social-media companies such as Facebook and Google, which regularly have pursued more data capacity, could expand operations, he said. Just a third of the planet has Internet access today, according to Boeing. Large pockets of people in Africa and South America go without it. Geographical and socioeconomic obstacles prevent the installation of the necessary technology. Within 20 years, however, Lasercom has the potential to bring everyone together in cyberspace. Among other advantages, it would create major educational advances, Johnson said. “Connecting the rest of the world will be revolutionary,” Johnson said. “Think of all the online courses in the past five to 10 years that have become part of everyday life. If we were able to connect the rest of the world with classes at USC (University of Southern California) or Stanford or the London School of Economics, and provide them the ability to gain that knowledge, think of the barriers that would be broken.” In the highly secure Lasercom lab in Southern California, fans hum loudly overhead. Engineers, dressed in white lab coats, hairnets and safety glasses share tight quarters with large computer components, display monitors of every kind, and yards of fiber, wires and cords. A miniature Lasercom terminal, with an optical bench attached, sits on a stand in the middle of the busy activity, as if to constantly remind everyone of what they’re creating and modifying. The satellite division of Boeing, formerly Hughes Aircraft, was one of the first to work with laser communications, beginning in the early 1970s. Parallel efforts at McDonnell Douglas, another Boeing heritage company, also brought early Lasercom developments and hardware experiments, according to 16 BOEING FRONTIERS
Frontiers December 2015 - January 2016 Issue
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