6G at $\frac{1}{6}g$: The Future of Cislunar Communications
Sahan Liyanaarachchi, Stavros Mitrolaris, Purbesh Mitra, Sennur Ulukus
TL;DR
This paper addresses the challenge of enabling robust cislunar communications for an expanding set of lunar missions by importing 6G concepts into the space domain. It surveys LunaNet architecture, DTN, optical links, RIS, multi-relay networks, semantic and goal-oriented communications, and security frameworks, mapping them to cislunar needs. It proposes constellation designs, scheduling policies, caching strategies, and privacy-preserving storage approaches to realize scalable and secure interplanetary connectivity. The work highlights the potential to establish a sustainable, high-performance cislunar infrastructure essential for long-term human and robotic exploration.
Abstract
What will the future of cislunar communications be? The ever-expanding horizons of the space exploration missions, and the need for establishing sustainable space communication and navigation infrastructure necessitate to think this question thoroughly. In this article, we examine how some of the concepts of 6G technologies developed for terrestrial networks can be relevant in the context of cislunar networks. We discuss how 6G concepts, such as reconfigurable intelligent surfaces, quantum-resistant physical layer security, private information read/write/cache networks, semantic and goal-oriented communications, information freshness based quality of communication metrics, multi-relay and cooperative networks, hold the potential to shape the future of cislunar communications.