Part 7/10:
Given the current technological constraints, the most practical application for space-based data centers involves processing data collected by satellites before transmitting it back to Earth. High-bandwidth links from space are still a bottleneck; terrestrial data centers support transfer rates exceeding one terabit per second, while satellite links max out around 1 gigabit per second, a thousandfold difference.
Therefore, performing initial processing in space reduces data transmission loads and latency, especially for applications like remote sensing and Earth observation. Conversely, it’s less practical to conduct data-heavy tasks such as AI training entirely in orbit, unless satellite communication bandwidth improves substantially.