As NASA specified in a NASA press release, a hologram medical team was "holoported" aboard the International Space Station in late 2021, making them the first-ever humans to have their 3D likenesses projected into outer space of technology by Microscope and a startup company named AEXA Aerospace.

According to a Futurism report, NASA flight surgeon Dr. Josef Schmid, one of the doctors in the team who were "holoported" into the ISS, said that this is a new manner of communication throughout vast distances.

Moreover, it is a brand-new way of human discovery, where the human entity can travel off the Earth. Joining Schmid in the holoportation was AEXA Aerospace CEO Fernando De La Pena Llaca.

  

Through the use of a Microsoft Hololens Kinetic camera and a personal computer with custom software from AEXA, the European Space Agency astronaut Thomas Pesquet had a two-way conversation with Dela Pena and Schmid's live images placed at the center of the ISS. This was the first so-called "holoportation handshake" from this planet.

Plans are for this next with two-way communication, where people on this planet are holoported to space and astronauts are placed back on earth.

Schmid said the technology would be used for private medical conferences, family conferences, psychiatric conferences, and brig VIPs into the space station to visit astronauts or cosmonauts.

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ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet
(Photo: INA FASSBENDER/AFP via Getty Images)
ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Thomas Pesquet poses in front of an image of himself at the end of a press conference at the European Astronaut Centre in Cologne, western Germany, on November 12, 2021, three days after his landing on the SpaceX capsule off the coast of Florida carrying him and three other astronauts who had spent six months on the International Space Station (ISS).


What is Holoportation?

NASA describes holoportation as a "type of capture technology" that enables high-quality 3D prototypes of people to be rebuilt, compressed, and transmitted live anywhere in real-time, explained Schmid.

When integrated with mixed reality displays like HoloLens, it enables users to see, hear, and interact with remote participants in 3D as if they are, in fact, present in the same physical space.

Holoportation has been used by Microsoft since at least 2016, although this is the first use in such an extreme and environment-like space.

Schmid says it does not matter that the space station travels 17,500 mph. He added that it is in constant motion in orbit 250 miles on top of Earth, as the astronaut can return three minutes or three weeks after, and with the system running, "we will be there in the spot live on the ISS."

Using Hololens Kinetic Camera and Computer

Essentially, sci-fi enthusiasts are likely familiar with holographic doctors, provided that the famous film Star Trek Voyager starred highlighted a "beloved hologram doctor character" most frequently cited simply as "Doc."

This is the first time in real-life, though, that people aboard a spacecraft have interacted through Microsoft with holograms. As NASA noted, it has been dabbling in hologram technology since 2016.

Using the Hololens Kinetic camera of Microsoft and a computer custom outfitted with AEXA software, Schmid and others on his Earthbound team were able to chat with Pesquet while he was aboard the ISS.

Together with the hologram tech, AEXA is interested too in developing augmented reality and virtual reality software, which would mean "holodecks" such as those aboard a lot of the famed "Star Trek" starships may soon turn into reality, as well.

Information about holoportation is shown on I3D Past Project's YouTube video below:

 

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