Internet creator hopes to connect planets

Thursday, 06 January 2005, 20:30 IST
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AHMEDABAD: The man who connected the earth with the click of a mouse is now working on an "interplanetary" network that would hook up planets of the solar system to aid scientists in their future space missions. According to Vincent G. Cerf, the man who in 1970 designed the ARPANET, the software protocol which laid the seeds for the Internet, the new Internet across the solar system would help scientists understand other planets and would also help astronauts in their communications with earth. Mars should be connected by 2009 and Jupiter by 2012, Cerf told IANS on the sidelines of the 92nd Indian Science Congress here. The development comes in the wake of US plans to send a man to Mars some time after 2020. "The new protocol would set the basic structure for connectivity in space to standardise communication protocol. It could be expanded as and when time demands," said Cerf, who is currently senior vice president of Technology Strategy in the US. According to him, the present Internet protocol was not applicable due to factors like distance, lack of gravity and pressure and a completely new design had to be initiated. "Even light takes six minutes from Earth to Mars, and the farthest planets are 40 minutes apart. So our protocol had to be faster than light," he said, adding that it took him five years to design the new one. As part of the new design, earth would be given a set of satellites -- the Deep Space Network. The satellites, situated roughly around the equator, would have three large antennae at 120 degrees from each other "so that they get complete 360-degree connectivity of the entire earth all the time", Cerf said. A solar-powered radio system would be sent to Mars, on board the two dedicated orbiting satellites Spirit and Opportunity that have been revolving around the red planet for the past two years. For Jupiter, however, the process would be more complex since solar-powered cells cannot be used due to lack of sunlight there and also decrease with distance.
Source: IANS