[mapt]

The DSN is a radio network. In its present form, this is going to be ineffective for receiving a meaningful amount of imagery data from signals emitted by a lightweight space probe at 500AU. At ~150AU the current 25-70m dishes are getting less than 40 bits per second from Voyager 1.

Instead, we would use lasers with a far superior gain to what radio communication is capable of. The divergence on even a decent pocket laser pointer diode is less than 0.1 degree. This is a gain of 10*log10(41,253/(0.1*0.1)) = 66 degrees. Launch telescopes of modest size can increase this further. Then receiver telescopes fitted with narrowband filters can hone in on that laser signal.

> "First, transmitted beams from optical telescopes are far more slender than their radio counterparts owing to the high gain of optical telescopes (150 dB for the Keck Telescope versus 70 dB for Arecibo)." - https://www.princeton.edu/~willman/observatory/oseti/bioast9...