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Spinoff story
Pulsed Laser Innovations Power Nobel-Winners’ Research
A real-world story of NASA technology finding a life beyond the mission.
About this technology
Overview
Astronauts regularly post tweets from orbit, and images stream across the solar system, but the amount of data coming from space is growing rapidly. We need more bandwidth, and the best solution is laser communications. San Jose, California-based PolarOnyx Inc. specializes in very fast-pulsed lasers, which are ideal for space-to-ground transmissions. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory funded multiple SBIR contracts over the years that have helped the company develop and perfect its lasers, and it has sold more than 400 since 2005, including to multiple Nobel Prize winners.