this post was submitted on 13 Mar 2025
336 points (100.0% liked)

Science Memes

14373 readers
2140 users here now

Welcome to c/science_memes @ Mander.xyz!

A place for majestic STEMLORD peacocking, as well as memes about the realities of working in a lab.



Rules

  1. Don't throw mud. Behave like an intellectual and remember the human.
  2. Keep it rooted (on topic).
  3. No spam.
  4. Infographics welcome, get schooled.

This is a science community. We use the Dawkins definition of meme.



Research Committee

Other Mander Communities

Science and Research

Biology and Life Sciences

Physical Sciences

Humanities and Social Sciences

Practical and Applied Sciences

Memes

Miscellaneous

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 
all 35 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] [email protected] 125 points 1 month ago (3 children)

The magic of a clear line of sight and vacuum for a good ~384'300km!

So should we do low power communications by using the moon as reflector dish?

[–] [email protected] 91 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Also, directional vs omnidirectional antennas.

[–] [email protected] 51 points 1 month ago (1 children)

This is the most important part.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 1 month ago (1 children)

And not encoding any data. Well a laser pulse is kind of datum.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 month ago

One bit! That’s all you get!

[–] [email protected] 40 points 1 month ago (1 children)

There was a NSA program that listened to soviet messages by collecting the transmissions that bounced off the moon.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

I gotta say, the moon’s really starting to sound like a fucking snitch.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

I am worried about 2000ms ping

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago

That's what the anti-tachyon modulation circuit is for, to change the time phase and remove most of that lag. Once they're in sync, it's literally real time!

[–] [email protected] 36 points 1 month ago

the distance is 384400km

That's almost the distance between my bed and the kitchen before my first cup of coffee!

[–] [email protected] 29 points 1 month ago (4 children)

It's easy, you just need a big antenna, low noise receiver (just cool it) for low bandwidth (keeps noise power low) and no interferers in the same frequency band.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago

It's almost too easy

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Show me a non-directional antenna.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Omni-directional antennas?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Omnidirectional antennas attempt to radiate equally horizontally. An isotropic antenna radiates equally in all directions but is only theoretical. All antennas have some gain.

That being said, there are some antennas that attempt to minimize that gain and be as non-directional as possible while other antennas attempt to maximize that gain and become as directional as possible.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Just because you call it non-directional doesn't mean it is. They all have gain compared to a theoretical isotropic antenna.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

And how is that relevant? Everybody knows they mean low gain antennas

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Perfect. Now put those on cell phones and make it fit in your pocket.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Technology always gets better with no regard to physical limits.

(People who argue this unironically are a pet peeve of mine. Yes, there are limitations on what's possible.)

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

That's fair, though I think we also should thank the use of Travelling Wave Tubes (TWTs or 'twits'). These little tubes of witchcraft amplify the transmission signal to make sure we can still hear, say, the Voyager 1 that's currently over 15-billion miles away.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 month ago (1 children)

My Bluetooth buds often get interference - technically 100 mW, distance from my head to a pocket.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago

technically 100 mW

Technically a maximum of 100 mW, but realistically much lower than that.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I use about 800mW for my fpv drone and if you get a little bit away from yourself and go behind a tree or something you could lose video pretty easily

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Wonder what the latency would be like trying to fly my 3.5" on the moon from earth

Although I suppose the lack of atmosphere would be the bigger issue...

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago

Well duh is space, you gotta put flames on the side for it to go fast

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago

I bet the receiver that had noise figure low enough to detect that signal consumed more than 3nW while doing it.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago (1 children)

To be fair, that's an insignificant distance for light to travel.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Still takes at least 2 seconds for the round trip.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Well, according to my ex, even 30 or 90 seconds is an interval unworthy of consideration.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)