deep space network:
Finding
the signal
for 50 years
By Tony Rice
Robotic missions exploring our solar system have wowed the world
with their discoveries and especially the images they return. But even
the most sophisticated spacecraft is useless until the science and
engineering it gathers makes it back to Earth. NASA’s one of a kind
collection of massive dishes around the world makes that possible.
The NASA Deep Space Network (DSN) is an international network
of communications complexes supporting interplanetary spacecraft
missions and doing a bit of science on its own. The network is made
up of huge antennae located at three locations
separated by approximately 120º longitude
around the Earth ensuring spacecraft are
visible to at least one at all times.
Goldstone located in California’s
Mojave Desert halfway between
JPL in Pasadena and Las Vegas;
at Robledo near Madrid, Spain;
and at Tidbinbilla near Canberra,
Australia. The complexes stay
synchronized within microseconds
of each other via atomic clocks.
During its first year of operation,
the DSN communicated with
just three spacecraft. Since
then it has played a central
role in each of NASA’s highprofile exploration missions,
including early Pioneer probes, the
Mariner missions of the 1960s and
1970s, Viking and Voyager, Galileo,
Cassini- Huygens, as well as each of
the Mars rover missions. Today Earth’s
only global spacecraft communication
network communicates with 30+ spacecraft
including those from international partners such as the
Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (Venus Climate Orbiter),
European Space Agency (Mars Express), and most recently The
Indian Space Research Organisation (Mars Orbiter Mission).
Deep Space
Network
complexes are
distributed approximately 120º
of longitude around the Earth
ensuring spacecraft are visible
to at least one at all times.
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