CHINA has reportedly begun assembling an AI supercomputer in space, which will eventually consist of 2,800 satellites in Earth’s orbit.
ADA Space, based in Chengdu, sent the first 12 satellites of its mammoth network last week, Space News reported.
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These satellites are able to process the data they collect locally, rather than beaming it to stations on Earth to compute, according to ADA.
Data stored onboard satellites is sent down to Earth in batches – but some of this information can get lost during transmission.
Beyond being slow, “less than 10 per cent” of satellite data makes it to Earth due to things limited bandwidth and ground station availability, according to the South China Morning Post.
Part of ADA’s ‘Star Compute’ project, the satellites are reportedly in-built with super-fast AI processors that can communicate with sister satellites at up to 100GB per second using lasers.
That is much faster than traditional satellites.
The network can also share 30 terabytes worth of storage between them, Space News added.
For context, that’s enough storage for 20,000 HD movies, or 10 years of continuous video recording on a single hard drive.
The 12 satellites that were launched last week carry scientific payloads, including a special tool for picking up brief cosmic phenomena such as gamma-ray bursts, called a X-ray polarisation detector.
But they can also be used to create 3D digital twin data for purposes like emergency response, gaming, and tourism, ADA Space said in its announcement.
ADA Space announced it would collaborate with Zhejiang Lab on the satellite constellation last summer.
The satellites were launched aboard a Long March 2D rocket on 14 May, from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in northwest China.
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