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Readers! A November fund-raising drive!

 

It is unfortunately time for another November fund-raising campaign to support my work here at Behind the Black. I really dislike doing these, but 2025 is so far turning out to be a very poor year for donations and subscriptions, the worst since 2020. I very much need your support for this webpage to survive.

 

And I think I provide real value. Fifteen years ago I said SLS was garbage and should be cancelled. Almost a decade ago I said Orion was a lie and a bad idea. As early as 1998, long before almost anyone else, I predicted in my first book, Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8, that private enterprise and freedom would conquer the solar system, not government. Very early in the COVID panic and continuing throughout I noted that every policy put forth by the government (masks, social distancing, lockdowns, jab mandates) was wrong, misguided, and did more harm than good. In planetary science, while everyone else in the media still thinks Mars has no water, I have been reporting the real results from the orbiters now for more than five years, that Mars is in fact a planet largely covered with ice.

 

I could continue with numerous other examples. If you want to know what others will discover a decade hence, read what I write here at Behind the Black. And if you read my most recent book, Conscious Choice, you will find out what is going to happen in space in the next century.

 

 

This last claim might sound like hubris on my part, but I base it on my overall track record.

 

So please consider donating or subscribing to Behind the Black, either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. I could really use the support at this time. There are five ways of doing so:

 

1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.

 

2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation. Takes about a 10% cut.
 

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Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
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You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.


Engineers set new laser communications record to asteroid probe Psyche

Psyche-Earth laser communications record
Click for original graphic.

As part of a continuing test program, engineers have set a new long distance laser communications record, exceeding 290 million miles, by successfully using a laser to send communicate with the asteroid probe Psyche from Earth.

The graph to the right, not to scale, shows the orbital configuation of the laser record. It appears however that little actual data was sent in this last test. It merely demonstrated that a link could be established. An actual data transfer record by laser occurred in June.

On June 24, when Psyche was about 240 million miles (390 million kilometers) from Earth — more than 2½ times the distance between our planet and the Sun — the project achieved a sustained downlink data rate of 6.25 megabits per second, with a maximum rate of 8.3 megabits per second. While this rate is significantly lower than the experiment’s maximum, it is far higher than what a radio frequency communications system using comparable power can achieve over that distance.

The high data rates promised by laser communications will significantly improve deep space operations. Most especially, the ability to get data back in much larger packets more quickly will reduce the antenna bottleneck on Earth that limits the number of missions as well as the data can be returned daily. More missions will be able to fly, and scientists and engineers will get their results faster.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

2 comments

  • pawn

    Wow, this could really shake up the DSN world. That’s a huge data rate and I guess they just need a telescope as a receiver not a huge dish.

  • TallDave

    someday soon the starseeds will be powered by their comms

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