Interplanetary Internet facts for kids
An interplanetary internet does not exist yet. When people talk about an interplanetary internet, they are talking about a problem they are still trying to solve - the problem of making the internet to work between different planets.
Contents
Method
The way the internet works here on Earth is simple. Computers need to connect to each and can share a network. One computer sends another computer a message (called a packet) and then the other sends back a message saying it got it. This works fine because the messages only take a second to get back and forth. But if you were sending that message to Mars, it would take about ten minutes for the message to get there, and another ten for it to get back. That means we need to completely change the way computers talk to each other if we are going to communicate between different planets. That is the problem people are trying to solve when they talk about the interplanetary internet. It's a new and a very interesting concept.
Earth orbit
Earth orbit is sufficiently nearby that conventional protocols can be used. For example, the International Space Station has been connected to the regular terrestrial Internet since January 22, 2010 when the first unassisted tweet was posted . However, the space station also serves as a useful platform to develop, experiment, and implement systems that make up the interplanetary Internet. NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) have used an experimental version of the interplanetary Internet to control an educational rover, placed at the European Space Operations Centre in Darmstadt, Germany, from the International Space Station. The experiment used the DTN protocol to demonstrate technology that one day could enable Internet-like communications that can support habitats or infrastructure on another planet.
Images for kids
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The speed of light, illustrated here by a beam of light traveling from Earth to the Moon, would limit the speed at which messages would be able to travel in the interplanetary Internet. In this example, it takes light 1.26 seconds to travel from the Earth to the Moon. Due to the vast distances involved, much longer delays may be incurred than in the Earth-bound Internet.
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Simplified Interplanetary Internet overview, Mars to Earth communication
See also
In Spanish: Internet interplanetario para niños
