17 Nov, 2025
Have you ever asked yourself which protocols get used when downloading pictures from the Perseverance Mars rover to Earth? I hadn’t thought about that either, until I came across an intriguing message on the internet, back in April 2024:
I’m looking for someone knowledgeable of quic/quinn to help us out for our deep space IP project. Would be of part-time consulting. Please dm me if interested.
The message itself is quite short and somewhat jargon-y, so it took me a few readings to fully realize what the project was about:
Working with QUIC: an internet protocol for reliable communication (i.e., what we typically use TCP for).
Working with Quinn: the most popular Rust implementation of the QUIC protocol.
Using QUIC to communicate between Earth and computers that are far, far away (e.g., other planets).
Business was going well on my end, and I didn’t have much time to dedicate to another consulting engagement, but… How could I say no to an interplanetary internet project? I had contributed to Quinn in the past, so I felt well-equipped to help out and decided to actually do it. This article provides a record of the adventure so far.
What are we trying to solve?
Deep space is big and full of challenges. The technical feat of running a network at all in such an environment is nothing short of a miracle. To some extent, the problem is solved: we (humanity) regularly exchange messages with rovers on Mars, and are even communicating with spacecraft outside of the solar system. However, as more and more players enter the space exploration scene, limitations in the current architecture become apparent.
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